Mass Effect: A Liar's Tale
by KingMcRory
Summary: How much damage can one person cause in an effort to change fate? This is the story of one man's effort to change only what was necessary. (This is my first time posting anything anywhere. Predominately Mass Effect but with a few pieces of technology thrown in from other sources. Reviews welcome.)
1. New Friends Under Fire

The invaders came out of nowhere.

Gunnery Chief Ashley Williams was with her squad, doing a routine patrol, when an enormous ship dropped out of the sky. It emitted some kind of signal that speared directly into her brain. From the way her squadmates screamed in pain, she knew that it wasn't just her. Comms went dead, and then _they_ came.

Geth.

The synthetics hadn't been seen outside the Perseus Veil in nearly three hundred years. But now, here they were on Eden Prime.

 _Who would want to attack Eden Prime?_ Ashley thought to herself as she laid down suppressing fire, the rest of her squad falling back. _We're just a bunch of farmers and scientists!_

Her squad was finally out of immediate danger. Ashley fired one last burst from her assault rifle before jumping to her feet and running after them. Now that she had a moment to think about it, the only thing she could come up with that could possibly be worth all this was that Prothean 'beacon' the archeologists had dug up the other day.

 _But was it_ really?

She didn't know. Right now, she just needed to focus on surviving; she and her fellow Marines weren't equipped to handle something like this. Trained, possibly. Equipped? Definitely not.

Her squad leader rallied the troops and made a plan: they were going to try to circle around and hit the geth from the rear. Maybe afterward they could figure out what was going on here.

 **SIX MINUTES LATER**

Ashley was all that was left of her squad. The rest had been wiped out by a geth ambush as they tried to get behind the main group. She was running now, running like the devil himself was behind her. For all she knew, that's what this was: the end of the world.

She stumbled, tripping and hitting the ground. She rolled as fast as she could, doing anything to keep moving. Throwing herself back to her feet, she ran a few more yards before half-sliding, half-falling down into a ravine. She slammed into the far side, letting out a sharp yelp as her shoulder proved more fragile than the rock.

She didn't stop, though. She _couldn't_ stop.

Twenty yards further along the dry gulch, there was a flurry of pulse-fire overhead. Ashley skidded to a stop, falling on her backside as she backpedaled. Over the pounding of her heart and the ripping sound of the geth's pulse rifles, though, she heard the familiar and welcome sound of a mass-accelerator weapon.

 _The Alliance!_

An explosion, _extremely_ close by, wiped the newborn smile from Ashley's face. Then, she heard the last possible sound she would've thought to hear in the middle of this kind of chaos: someone was _laughing._

"Ha! Take _that,_ ye synthetic bastards!" Another long burst of gunfire followed though the return pulse-fire was weaker.

Ashley scrambled back to her feet. Whoever was up there, they were going to need help. Ashley drew her assault rifle and took a few quick breaths as she psyched herself up. Before she could begin to climb out of the gulch, though, the voice shouted, "And 'ere's one for your mother!" followed by another explosion.

That one was closer. As rocks and clumps of burning grass rained down around her, Ashley wondered, _Who in their right mind gave this guy_ explosives?

In a clatter of armor and rocks, a figure tumbled into Ashley's gulch, bouncing off the far side and landing in a heap at the bottom. Not taking any chances, Ashley threw her rifle to her shoulder and aimed at the man as he pushed himself to his feet.

"Identify yourself!" she commanded, burying the fear under training. She noticed that his armor was similar to what Alliance Marines wore, but it was painted light grey with blue and white slashes. She didn't see any insignias, either.

"Hey! I'm talking to you, mister!" she shouted again.

At first, she thought that the guy was grunting in pain. As the dust settled and rocks stopped bouncing down around him, though, she realized that he was chuckling to himself. The mystery man finally got his feet under himself and straightened up, holding his hands carefully out to his sides.

The first thing Ashley noticed about him was that he was _big._ Well over six feet tall, with broad shoulders and a narrow waist: powerful, but not bulky.

The second thing was his face. It wasn't that he was particularly cute, but he _was_ handsome. Taking in his features - lightly tanned skin with black stubble on his chin and brown eyes that flickered with mirth even as he stared down the muzzle of her rifle - she had the feeling that this guy's most dangerous quality was his confidence.

He slowly raised his right hand, careful to keep his assault rifle from pointing anywhere near her, and clipped it to his back before holding up both hands to her. "See? I'm unarmed. Nary a threat," he said, his accent putting odd rolls in all the wrong places. It had a strong Irish lilt, but with something harsher wiping out the melody.

Yet, Ashley trusted his tone. Shaking off the feeling, she gripped her rifle tighter and repeated her command: "Identify yourself!"

The guy relaxed somewhat, purposefully reinforcing the impression that he wasn't a threat to her. "Name's John McTaggart. Friends call me 'Tag'."

Ashley nodded once in acknowledgement. Her grip didn't slacken, however. "All right, _McTaggart._ What the hell are you doing here?"

A look of confusion crossed his face, and he gestured with a small wave of his hand the way he had come. "Ye mean…?"

"Yes!"

McTaggart shrugged, careful not to startle Ashley into shooting him. "I got the feeling those synthetic beasties didn't really 'ave the colony's best interests at 'eart, so I decided t' help out."

Ashley found herself unwilling to believe anything that came out of the newcomer's mouth, while at the same time, she trusted him. She didn't really know why, and the opposing feelings were confusing her. But, he wasn't shooting at her, had just taken out a handful of geth by himself, and, to top it off, she knew that she was going to need some help to get out of here alive.

She had no choice but to trust McTaggart.

That didn't mean that she was going to give him _blind_ trust. "What unit are you with?" she wanted to know.

When she relaxed her grip on her rifle, McTaggart slowly lowered his hands. Shaking his head, he replied, "No unit. I'm a freelancer, me; just got t' Eden Prime on the last transport. I was heading into town t' talk to a friend o' mine."

Suspicious, Ashley demanded: "Who's your friend?"

McTaggart replied without hesitation. "Another freelancer by the name o' Goose."

Ashley thought about his response: it _could_ be true. There were a few freelancers that passed through Eden Prime from time to time. She didn't know them all, so there was no way to find out if McTaggart was telling the truth while standing in a gulch during an invasion.

"Well," she said after a moment, "the geth are running all over the place. I already lost my squad and have seen too many civilians killed, so it looks like I'm going to have to trust you. I take it you can fight?"

McTaggart gave her a look and gestured back towards the geth he'd taken out single-handedly. "Uh... Aye, I can fight."

Ashley had to resist a surprisingly strong urge to shoot him in the kneecaps and take her chances on her own. She fought it back and settled for rolling her eyes. "Fine. I'm Gunnery Chief Ashley Williams, with the Alliance Navy."

McTaggart took a step forward and extended his hand. "Nice t' meet ye, Chief Williams."

She gave him a suspicious look before giving his hand a firm but quick shake. "Come on. Follow me and keep your head on a swivel; these bastards don't even _breathe._ "

As McTaggart unslung his assault rifle once more and fell into step behind her, she could practically _feel_ him thinking. It came as no surprise, then, when he asked, "Is that 'ow your squad got taken out, then?"

Ashley gritted her teeth, glad that McTaggart was behind her. "Yes. We walked into an ambush." She glared back at him and added: "So keep _quiet."_

His response was a grin, followed by a casual two-fingered salute and a quipped, "Aye ma'am," that made her seriously reconsider her decision to not shoot him. His casualness towards her squad's death made her _furious,_ but she knew better than to hash it out then and there. Too often, she'd been assigned to units with one or more insensitive jerks, men and women who only joined up for the chance to shoot something, so she knew how to work with McTaggart's kind.

She didn't have to like it, though.

A few more minutes hiking brought them to a bend in the gulch. Ashley paused for a moment as she tried to figure out the best way forward.

"What's the plan, Chief?"

McTaggart's oddly accented voice cut through her concentration, leaving her gritting her teeth. It wasn't so much his accent that was making her want to punch him, but, rather, the fact that he was talking at all. She wanted to get out of here to escape _him_ as much as the geth. She still couldn't put her finger on it, but the freelancer rubbed her wrong.

Ashley pushed it to the back of her mind and answered his question anyway, knowing that they had to work together. Pointing straight ahead, she said, "Town is that way, but that means leaving the gulch and upping the chance that the geth will spot us."

McTaggart nodded easily. "Right. Not the best course… Any other ideas?"

Gritting her teeth and doing her best to keep it out of her voice, Ashley nodded. "Yeah. This leads back to town, but it winds around quite a bit."

"How much is 'quite a bit'?" McTaggart asked, doubtfully eyeing the gulch as it stretched out into the distance.

"Fifteen miles," Ashley replied dejectedly.

McTaggart's nod was slow and deliberate, sarcastic. "Well...I know which one _I_ would choose." Before Ashley could smash his face in, he added - in an obscenely cheerful tone - "Let's see what's out there first, though, shall we?"

He triggered his omni-tool, its orange hologram forming a gauntlet of light around his left forearm. Using the fingers of the same hand, he keyed instructions into the haptic interface in his palm. A sphere of nearly translucent green and yellow lights appeared in the palm of his hand, and he tossed it skyward. The little drone's tiny mass effect core was enough to propel it up to one hundred feet.

"'ere, take a look," he said, inviting Ashley to look at his display.

She stepped over and looked into the holographic screen that floated above his forearm. What she saw was a bird's-eye view of the surrounding area: dead-center was herself and McTaggart, standing in the gulch. At the top of the screen - north - was a group of geth. The three synthetics were directly in their way if they were planning on taking the short route to town.

To make matters worse, there were two pairs of drones. About the size of a picnic basket - if picnic baskets had miniature pulse rifles slung underneath - the flyers were fast and deadly; Ashley had already seen good soldiers and innocent civilians cut down by the drones.

"Looks like we're taking the long way around," she said dejectedly. She _hated_ hiking.

But McTaggart wasn't ready to resign himself to the long walk. "Come on," he said as he hoisted himself out of the gulch. "I've a plan."

" _McTaggart!"_ Ashley hissed, not wanting to risk alerting the geth to their presence. For a long moment, she seriously considered leaving the annoying freelancer behind. She _could,_ with no regrets; it wasn't her fault that he was an idiot. And she _really_ didn't like the man.

But she also didn't want to give up the chance to get back at the synthetic bastards that had massacred her whole squad. After another moment's thought, she also realized that her sense of duty wouldn't let her allow McTaggart to go off on his own.

With a groan, and knowing that she was probably going to regret it, Ashley followed the freelancer out of the gulch.

Staying in a crouch, she made her way up a short rise to the stand of trees that lined the ridge. She flattened herself out in the grass next to McTaggart, who was busy eyeing the synthetics as they milled around the clearing beneath them.

"What are they doing?" she asked after a moment.

Without taking his eyes off the machines, the freelancer shrugged. "Nary a clue." He pointed at a group of tripods over on the far side. "Have ye seen anything like _that_ before?"

The tripods were about waist-high, with a short spike protruding from the center of the two-foot diameter core of the things. The geth were working on them while the drones stayed on the lookout for any nosy organics.

Ashley shook her head. "No. What are they?"

Again, McTaggart shrugged. "No clue."

Ashley was getting very tired of the freelancer, and she'd only known him for ten minutes. "I thought you said you had a plan," she said after another few moments of silence.

He finally looked at her, his face cracking in another irritating grin under his helmet. "Well, they don't like it when ye shoot at them." At her withering glare, he added, "What? I worked that out meself."

"You," she said, forcefully, "are an _idiot."_

Infuriatingly, he chuckled as he turned back to the geth. "Don't worry. I'll nay take that personally, Chief."

Ashley opened her mouth to reply, but McTaggart shushed her. "Look! There's motion off t' the left!"

Looking where he was pointing, Ashley saw three more geth rounding the corner. Her jaw clenched when she saw that they were each dragging a body behind them. Fortunately, she saw that they were already dead, their bodies riddled by pulse fire. She wondered what the geth wanted with dead humans…

The geth dragged their grisly cargo over to the tripods. The first bent down and picked up the dead farmer, gripping under its arms and lifting it like a giant infant. The synthetic laid the body on top of the tripod, impaling its back on the spike in the center.

"What are they-?"

Before Ashley could finish her question, the spike thrust skyward. It speared through the body's abdomen and continued on, lifting its burden up into the air. At full extension, the telescoping spike was about twelve feet high, with the body hanging about halfway down its length.

"Oh, God!" Ashley exclaimed. "What the he-"

McTaggart hurriedly clapped his hand over her mouth, cutting her off. " _Shush!_ Are ye _trying_ t' get us killed?"

Ashley realized that he was right, and she instantly stopped fighting him. McTaggart loosened his grip, and she watched as the geth impaled the rest of the bodies. Fury added to the tears falling from her eyes, and she shook her head, promising herself that she would make the geth pay for their desecration.

"What could they _possibly_ gain from impaling our dead like that?" she asked once she was sure she had control of her voice.

McTaggart shrugged again, though a little less sarcastically this time, and said, "I don't know… I've seen some armies do something like that for a psychological advantage. Ye know, goading their enemies into fighting with their 'earts instead o' their 'eads." He added that last part while looking sidelong at Ashley.

She gritted her teeth at his look, but she couldn't argue with his words; she _had_ almost charged down there to wreak her vengeance on the synthetics, regardless of the consequences. "Yeah, it seems a pretty effective tactic...for soulless monsters!"

McTaggart's reply was accompanied by yet another shrug. "I've seen humans do it, too."

It took a supreme exercise in willpower to resist the urge to punch the infuriating freelancer in the head, but Ashley managed it. She pointedly turned her attention back to the geth below them and tried to figure out if it was feasible to take on six of the synthetics - along with the drone air-support - with two people.

After a moment, McTaggart leaned over to whisper, "Ye got a plan, Chief?"

Incredulous, Ashley turned to him and just stared for a moment. " _No!_ I don't have anything even remotely resembling a plan!"

"Good thing I do, then!" McTaggart replied with a grin. "Ye any good with that long-barrel?"

Ashley's rage was somewhat diffused by her confusion at his terminology. Only when he gestured at her left shoulder did she realize that he was referring to her sniper rifle. Slipping it from its clip, she gave him a hard look and replied, "Yeah, pretty good."

"Good. Use this," he said, activating his omni-tool and sending her an app. "Give me thirty seconds, then shoot that red one o'er there."

Ashley nodded as she loaded the app the freelancer had given her from her omni-tool to her rifle; a blue hologram appeared on the side of it, visual confirmation that it was now firing phasic ammo. The rocket launcher-toting geth would have been her first target, anyway. "Wait... What are you gonna do?"

McTaggart had pushed himself back from the ridge and started off to the right. At her question, he glanced back with a grin and said, "I'm gonna get their attention."

Before she could ask for clarification, he was too far away to risk speaking. Cursing under her breath, Ashley turned back to the geth and lined up her sights on the red one.

Movement from the corner of her eye drew her attention. She panned her scope over and saw that it was one of the impaled bodies. _What the hell?_

All three of the impaled bodies were twitching, their limbs jerking spasmodically. _Something_ was happening to them, though she had no clue what.

Before she could work it out, there was a click over her comm.

 _"Oi. Chief. Ye there?"_

Surprised at hearing McTaggart's voice in her helmet, she demanded, "How did you get this frequency?"

" _I'm a wizard, me"_ came his reply. " _Look, I realized that we forgot t' sync our comms so I had t' find yours. I'm all ready t' go. Ye still got a bead on the Rocket Boy?"_

"Yes." Ashley had determined not to let McTaggart's flippancy distract her. So she was going to ignore it.

" _Sweet. Give the order, but wait till I attack before letting fly."_

Ashley had waited long enough. She gave the order immediately. "Go!"

Instantly, a sphere of electricity blossomed around one of the pairs of drones, artificial lightning sparking off of their shields. The one on the left lurched to the side and slammed into its partner, causing both drones to crash to the ground, defunct.

Ashley didn't see any of that, however. As soon as she saw the flash of McTaggart's attack, she squeezed the trigger of her Mantis sniper rifle. Its supersonic round, wrapped in a phasic envelope, penetrated the synthetic's shields as easily as it would have a soap bubble before shattering the thing's head. As it collapsed to the ground, she shifted her aim to the closest white-armored Trooper. Two heartbeats passed, and her rifle was cooled enough to fire another round. Another trigger-pull and another geth dropped to the ground, headless.

A swarm of four holographic drones attacked the remaining geth. Their electric attacks sparked off the Trooper's shields, weakening them before a burst of assault fire ripped into them. Ashley caught the tell-tale glimpse of blue surrounding the rounds that told her that McTaggart was using phasic rounds, too.

Annoying he may be, Ashley had to admit that McTaggart had some useful tech.

By the time that she had dropped two more Troopers, the field was empty. She did a quick visual scan to confirm that the freelancer had taken out the rest of the geth before getting to her feet. She clipped her sniper rifle to its slot behind her left shoulder and made her way down the steep slope in front of her. She reached the bottom just as McTaggart emerged from the tall grass to her right. A big grin was plastered on his face, and he met Ashley's eye, waving a hand at the synthetic carnage around them.

"See? Easy-peasy," he said, clipping his assault rifle to his back.

Ashley shook her head as she moved into the clearing. She couldn't believe how easy taking down the group of geth had seemed. The group that had ambushed her squad had been twelve-strong, but there had been eight Alliance Marines; this time, it had only been her and McTaggart. There was no way that his tech could have tipped the scales _that_ much.

While the freelancer inspected the defunct geth platforms with his omni-tool, Ashley headed over to the impaled corpses. They were still twitching, and, when she looked closer, their clothing was looking a little threadbare. Her lips twisted in disgust, but she couldn't resist the urge to reach out.

"Oi! I wouldn't do that if I were ye, Chief!" McTaggart was suddenly right beside her, shaking his head. "We've nary a clue as t' what the geth are actually doing t' them. There's no way t' know what would happen if ye touch them."

Ashley's anger at being called down was amplified by her knowing that he was right. It didn't feel right, though, to just leave them there. "What are we going to do with them, then?"

McTaggart took a moment from scanning them to shrug. "I'm not going t' do a bloody thing with 'em, Chief. I'm not Alliance, though, so what ye do with them is up t' ye. If ye want my _advice_ , I still say leave them and let's get outta 'ere."

Ashley considered his words for a second. McTaggart was right about not knowing what the geth were doing to them. He was also right about their priorities: they needed to get back to town.

She was really starting to hate that about him.

Suddenly, a shadow fell over them. Ashley's rifle was instantly in her hand and pointed at the sky, while McTaggart just craned his neck. A sleek, dark-hulled frigate passed not more than sixty feet over their heads, almost silent in the evening sky. A shimmer flickered across its hull as the setting sunlight glinted over it.

"Huh." McTaggart's voice had a grin in it, causing Ashley to glance over at him. Sure enough, a slight smile was pulling the corner of his mouth up.

"You recognize that ship?" she asked the freelancer.

McTaggart kept watching the sleek frigate until it disappeared behind a ridge to their right. Once it was gone, he looked back at Ashley, shaking his head. "Nope. Ne'er seen it before in me life." He was still grinning, though.

Ashley contemplated him for a moment longer. She finally realized one of the things that were bothering her about the freelancer: his reactions were off. He would say one thing, but his expression and body-language said something else. She didn't exactly get the feeling that he was _lying,_ but she still felt that she shouldn't fully trust him.

They still had to get out of here before another geth patrol came to check on the ones they'd just taken out, so Ashley pushed her concerns about her ad hoc partner to the back of her mind. "Come on. That frigate is our ticket out of here. It looked like they were dropping a team off; if we can hook up with them, we'll have a much better shot at getting out of this alive."

McTaggart shrugged as he drew his assault rifle. "Sounds good to me. Ye lead, I follow, Chief."

They hadn't taken more than a dozen steps before two pairs of drones floated around the bend behind them.

"Geth!" McTaggart hollered as he spun back to face them. Ashley spun, too, and immediately opened fire as the drones started bobbing and weaving. McTaggart launched an Overload app, catching one pair in a sphere of electricity, and then riddled them with rifle fire.

Ashley was trying to track the other two when sudden movement caught her eye: four more Troopers came around the corner and immediately opened fire.

" _McTaggart!"_

The freelancer was already on it. A holographic tray appeared above his omni-tool. Six softball-sized drones were launched and immediately attacked the Troopers. McTaggart drew his pistol with his left hand and opened fire on the geth with a weapon in either hand. Pulse-fire slammed into his shields but didn't stop him.

"Go, Chief!" he shouted without taking his eyes from the Troopers.

Despite her fear, Ashley shook her head. She triggered her Shield Boost, which would give her a few extra seconds before the geth Pulse-fire ripped through it, and tightened her grip on her rifle.

One of the Troopers fell under the concentrated fire of her, McTaggart, and the freelancer's drones. The surge of triumph was short-lived, though; three more Troopers rounded the corner, joining their mates in firing on the two outnumbered organics.

"Williams, _go!"_ McTaggart shouted again.

Ashley ground her teeth together before shouting back. "No! I'm not leaving a soldier behind!"

McTaggart barked a laugh, then replied: "I'm not a soldier, and I'm not one o' your men, Chief! One o' us has to make it outta' here, and I'm the best-suited t' holding these damn robots off long enough for _ye_ to get away!" To prove his point, two more drones were launched from his omni-tool, replacing the two that had been shot down.

Ashley hesitated for only a second more. When she saw that McTaggart was serious about her getting out of there, she cursed, turned, and ran, cradling her rifle in her arms as pulse-fire slammed into her shields.

The last she saw of the freelancer, he was backpedaling towards a pile of boulders as his shields shimmered under an overwhelming amount of pulse-fire.

Ashley picked herself up, shaking her head in an attempt to stop her ears from ringing. Rocks and clumps of grass tumbled from her head and shoulders. She wasn't sure how she'd ended up on the ground in the first place. Reaching her feet, she staggered as her head spun; her gene-mods were busy dealing with the worst of the damage, but even her military-grade enhancements couldn't handle all of the trauma that came with getting buried under a pile of earth.

Turning, she saw a column of smoke rising from behind the ridge she'd just rounded. Once the meaning of the sight sunk in, she groaned out loud; though she'd only known John McTaggart for twenty minutes - and he had been a pain in the ass the whole time - he had saved her life and given her a chance to get out of this mess.

Squaring her shoulders, she turned her back on the rising smoke and started in the direction that the mystery frigate had been headed. If she made it off of Eden Prime alive, she knew that she would never forget the freelancer.

She hadn't made it more than ten yards when pulse-fire burst all around her. Throwing a terrified glance over her shoulder, she saw two Drones flying straight for her. She took off at a flat-out run, adrenaline shooting through her veins as her heart pounded.

Ashley zig-zagged through a stand of boulders as pulse-fire slammed into her shields. In a last-ditch attempt to lose the Drones, she jumped to the left and slid down a ridge. It turned out to be steeper than she thought, and she ended up tumbling end over end. She hit the bottom in a small avalanche of rocks and dirt and scrambled to her feet. Without glancing back, she kept running.

By then, she was starting to think again. When the next burst of pulse-fire hit her shields, she stumbled forward and rolled. Spinning, she drew her pistol and fired from her prone position at the pair of Drones. To say that she was surprised when her flurry of shots managed to take out both of them would have been an understatement.

Her heart still pounding in her chest, she tried to take a deep breath. Movement caught her eye, and she looked to the left, back behind where she'd tumbled down the ridge, to see two geth Troopers manhandling one of the colonists. They picked him up and forced him back onto one of the spike-pedestals. Before she could even shout, the spike thrust skyward, spearing up through the still-living colonist's chest. He jerked spasmodically a few times, then died.

Spine-chilling horror washed over Ashley at the sight of the geth's atrocious act. It wasn't until both Troopers turned towards her, drawing their pulse-rifles, that she realized that she had screamed.

She pushed herself to her feet and scrambled towards a large boulder. Rounding it, she slammed her shoulder against the rock and drew her assault rifle. Taking a deep breath to steady her screaming nerves as her rifle unfolded, she readied herself for another fire-fight.

Ashley waited until she heard the crunch of their feet in the gravel close-by, then she leaned out and opened fire. With a wild scream, she squeezed the trigger.

A single, loud shot surprised her. The impact of a sniper round hitting its shields forced the closest Trooper to stagger back before Ashley's sustained fire shredded its weakened barrier and punched through its armor. With an electronic scream, the geth collapsed, its flashlight-eye winking out.

Meanwhile, its partner had been hit by an Overload attack, knocking out its shields completely before the sustained fire from an assault rifle and a pistol blew it to pieces.

For a long moment, Ashley just stood there, trying to catch her breath. Approaching footsteps finally made her turn. Three men in dark grey Onyx armor were coming down from the tree-line. The two walking side by side in the back were carrying an assault rifle and a pistol, respectively. The older of the two - the one with the pistol - was wearing light armor and scanning with his omni-tool. That, coupled with the tell-tale shimmer of a biotic Barrier flickering out of existence, told her that he was most likely a Sentinel.

The young soldier next to him was limping along, holding his side. Even from that distance, Ashley could see the hole in the kid's battered armor and the red streak that ran from it. There was barely a grimace on his face, though, and that was all Ashley needed to see to know that he was a Soldier through and through.

However, it was the man in front, striding confidently towards her as he put away his sniper rifle, that caught her attention. He was taller than his two team-mates, and Ashley briefly thought how much he looked like McTaggart. The soldier's eyes were blue, though, and he was definitely cuter than the late freelancer. His heavy Onyx armor had a red stripe down the right arm; even without the insignia on his chest plate, Ashley would have recognized him as an N7. Finally! Someone who can fight, she thought, sighing with relief.

Ashley clipped her rifle to her back and threw a salute to the N7. Only then did she notice that her hands were shaking. She did her best to keep her voice from shaking, as well, as she said, "Gunnery Chief Ashley Williams of the Two-Twelve. Are you in charge, sir?" As soon as the words were out of her mouth, she mentally kicked herself: Of course he's in charge, you idiot! He's the N7!

"Commander Shepard of the SSV Normandy," he said with a nod. Gesturing to the Sentinel, he introduced him as, "Lieutenant Alenko." He then nodded at the wounded kid. "Corporal Jenkins. Where's the rest of your unit, Williams?"

"They're...they're...I'm the only one left," she managed to say before her throat closed up.

Alenko was the first to speak. "Take your time, Chief. Tell us what happened."

After looking towards Shepard and seeing genuine concern, Ashley took a deep, calming breath. "My unit was out on patrol when the attack came. We...we lost a lot of people in the first few minutes. My CO decided to circle around and hit the geth from behind, but...we walked into an ambush. I've been running for my life ever since."

Alenko waited until it was apparent that she was done before saying, "The geth? They haven't been seen outside the Veil in nearly three-hundred years. What are they doing here?"

Ashley shrugged. Though she had wondered the same thing herself, she was too tired to give it much more thought. "I don't know for sure, but they could be here for the beacon."

The three men glanced at each other. Jenkins shrugged and did his best to hide the slight wince the motion caused. "Why not, Commander? That's why we're here, right?"

Shepard nodded at the Corporal, then turned back to Ashley. "What do you know about the beacon?"

"Not much," Ashley replied with a shrug. "They were extending the monorail and dug it up by accident. Pretty soon, every scientist on the planet was swarming all over it."

"Any idea what's on it?" Shepard wanted to know.

"No, sir. I'm just a Marine."

Shepard accepted that, knowing what she meant: it wasn't her job to know that kind of thing. After a moment's thought, he asked, "Do you know where the beacon is now?"

"It should still be at the dig-site." She slowly turned around to get her bearings. Pointing downhill, she said, "That way; through that cleft. They were talking about moving the beacon, but I don't know if they got around to it before the attack."

"It's a place to start," Shepard said. "Let's move out."

Ashley was surprised that the Commander seemed to be moving on without her. Before she could speak up, though, Jenkins asked, "What about her, Commander?"

Alenko nodded, adding, "We could use her help, Shepard. At the very least, she knows her way around the colony."

The confused expression on Shepard's face melted into a smile. "I wasn't planning on leaving her behind, guys." Turning to Ashley, he said, "I was including you in that order. Lead the way, Chief."

"Aye aye, sir!" Ashley replied, snapping off a smart salute. Fortunately, she turned before she could see the slight grins on the faces of Shepard and Alenko. She was just glad to have a squad and a goal again.

Before the group wandered off, Alenko walked over to the impaled colonist. Scanning the corpse and the device it was stuck on, he frowned. "What is the point of that?"

Shepard joined him, shaking his head. "Seems a little...excessive."

Ashley found herself standing next to Jenkins. Close up, she saw his armor was peppered with burns, some of which had blistered a layer or more of the ablative ceramic. It was apparent that he'd been caught by a flurry of pulse-fire. Besides the wound in his side, though, he seemed unharmed. The young corporal was doing his best to keep the pain off his face, but Ashley could tell that his wound was bothering him.

"Got yourself banged up there, Corporal. You feeling okay?"

"What?" The kid seemed surprised that Ashley had noticed his injury. "Oh. Yeah, I'm fine. The Lieutenant patched me up. I'm just itching to get a little payback."

Ashley grinned despite how tired she was. "Me, too, Corp. Just make sure you use that drive; don't let it drive you."

Jenkins looked ready to say something else, but then he remembered what Ashley had been through. "Ah...I'm sorry, ma'am. You lost your whole squad to the geth; I guess you don't want to hear me whining about a scratch."

Ashley was already shaking her head before the Corporal had finished. "That's not it at all, Jenkins. The fact that you're not freaking out at every sound after surviving what you have says a lot. I meant what I said, though: use what happened."

"Yes, ma'am," Jenkins replied with a relieved smile. "Thank you, ma'am."

"And knock it off with the 'ma'am'," Ashley added with a grin.

"Yes, ma'am...uh, I mean...okay."

Shepard and Alenko finished inspecting the impaled colonist, and the Commander waved for the rest to follow him as he headed down towards the dig-site.

"Have you seen a turian Spectre in the area?" Jenkins asked a few moments later.

The question caught Ashley by surprise since she had unconsciously pegged Jenkins as a shy kid. Her talking to him first seemed to have broken the ice between them, though. "There aren't any turians in Eden Prime; not that I know of, anyway. And I'm not sure I'd be able to tell a Spectre on sight."

Alenko snorted a laugh. "Oh, you'd be able to spot this guy. He's carrying enough firepower to take out a whole platoon," he said, then shared a chuckle with Jenkins.

"Yeah! Nihlus is a complete badass!" Jenkins added enthusiastically.

Ashley couldn't help but grin at the kid's outburst. "He's part of your unit? Why are you asking about him?"

"Spectres aren't really part of anyone's unit," Alenko responded. "But, yeah, we're working with him. Our Captain ordered radio silence while we're on the ground, and Nihlus is out of range of our hard suit comms. We're just trying to keep up with him."

The Commander interrupted then, addressing Ashley: "Chief, did you ever see the dig-site? What do you remember about its layout?"

Ashley quickly called up the dig-site's layout in her mind. "Yes, I saw it once. It's at the bottom of this trench. They were digging supports for the monorail, so the site itself is a circle. We're coming at it from the south, so the beacon should be ahead and a little to the left. There's another way out that goes to the right and up towards the science camp."

Shepard nodded as he visualized the site. It was Alenko, though, who asked, "What about cover?"

Ashley shook her head. "There's not really any in the site, except for the beacon itself. But the entrance on this end is kind of tight and strewn with boulders, so, if there are geth waiting for us, it could be a fight to get in."

The men fell silent at the mention of a geth ambush. They'd already fallen prey to one, and barely made it out without losing Jenkins; they had no desire to be caught by another.

A few more minute's walking brought the group to the base of the trench. Shepard called a halt, and the Marines took cover behind the various boulders scattered about. Ashley ended up sharing a boulder with the Commander. A single geth Trooper was visible from their position, but they knew there had to be more of them.

"Okay, Williams," Shepard whispered. "Show me what you've got."

Ashley gave a silent nod and drew her sniper rifle from her shoulder. As she readied her rifle and made sure that the phasic app that McTaggart had given her was loaded, Shepard whispered over the comm to the other two: "As soon as Williams takes her shot, open fire and move in. Don't give the geth time to recover, but don't hit the beacon."

A pair of clicks sounded over the channel, signaling their affirmatives, and Shepard drew his assault rifle before tapping Ashley on the shoulder. "Ready when you are, Chief."

Ashley settled her reticule over the Trooper's head and quieted her breathing as her finger caressed the trigger of her rifle.

Before she could fire, a sudden eruption of pistol fire threw off her aim and the geth that she had been sighting in on staggered, its shields flaring under an Overload attack.

The Commander barely missed a beat. "Open fire and move in!" he shouted at the squad. He was up and moving before the words were even out of his mouth. Rifle to his shoulder, he charged forward, pouring mass-accelerator rounds into the geth's weakened shields. Ashley was right on his heels, and her sniper round tore through the geth's soap-bubble strength shields and blew out its chest in a shower of sparks and grey fluid.

Alenko and Jenkins moved in from Ashley's left, their fire lancing off to the right at targets she couldn't see. Meanwhile, Shepard strafed right while firing left. Return fire lit up his shields, but Ashley was surprised by how unorganized it was.

A flock of fist-sized Drones was swarming all over Shepard's target, harrying its shields with electrical attacks, while another Trooper staggered under a flurry of pistol-fire.

She swapped her sniper rifle for her Avenger and moved in, covering Shepard. Together, the two of them took down three more geth. In mere moments, the fighting was over. The four Marines moved towards the center of the dig-site, each one casting their eyes about for any sign of a surprise attack.

But it was the figure standing on the ridge surrounding the dig-site that drew Ashley's attention. Is that...? No way...

Shepard didn't exactly aim at the newcomer, but he didn't lower his gun, either. "Identify yourself!"

"Seriously?" the man replied, holstering his pistol and holding his hands out. He retracted his breather and continued. "This is the thanks I get for saving your bloody hides? Ye Alliance types are a fair mite untrusting, aren't ye?"

Before Shepard could reply, Ashley blurted out: "McTaggart?!"

The freelancer seemed to notice her for the first time. His face split in a huge grin. "Chief! Ye did make it! I knew those synthetic bastards couldn't take ye down!"

Shepard and the other Marines all turned to look at Ashley, and she suddenly felt embarrassed. "You know this guy, Williams?" Shepard asked.

Keeping one eye on McTaggart as he leaped from the ridge to the top of one of the scaffolds that had been set up for the beacon, she replied, "Yes. Well, sort of... We only met about an hour ago. He's a freelancer, meeting some contact here. I thought..." She raised her voice, almost shouting at McTaggart as he clambered down off the scaffold: "I thought you were dead!"

McTaggart glanced at Shepard, acknowledging the Commander's authority, but replying to Ashley. "'Twas just a flesh wound, Chief." Sure enough, there wasn't very much of his armor that wasn't scorched or scuffed, but there didn't seem to be anything slowing him down. He wasn't even limping.

"But you were surrounded by geth when you told me to run!"

McTaggart just shrugged. "Couldn't have ye gettin' caught in the blast, now could I?"

Shepard chimed in at that point, intrigued despite himself. "'Blast'? How did you get away from the geth?"

"By doing something clever with me drones and explosives. Lots o' explosives," the freelancer said simply.

Before the conversation could go on too long, Lieutenant Alenko spoke up. "Sorry to intrude, Commander, but I thought you said the beacon was here, Williams."

The group turned to see what Alenko was talking about. In the middle of the dig-site, right where the beacon should have been, was an empty hole. "It was right here," Ashley confirmed. "They must have moved it."

"Who?" Alenko shrewdly asked. "Our side, or the geth?"

Ashley shrugged. "I don't know. They might know more up at the science camp. It's on top of that ridge," she said, pointing at a trail that led up to the right.

Shepard gave a nod and gestured with his rifle. "Lead the way, Williams."

As the group started to move out, Jenkins nodded towards McTaggart and addressed Shepard. "What about him, Commander?"

"We're not leaving anyone behind, Jenkins." Turning to the freelancer, Shepard asked, "How are you at following orders, McTaggart?"

The freelancer wobbled his outstretched hand and replied with a grin. "Fair t' middlin'." At the serious look on Shepard's face, McTaggart made an effort to wipe the grin off his own and tried again. "You're the boss, bossman. Ye lead, I follow."

Shepard's reply was a single, unamused nod. "Kaidan, you and McTaggart cover the rear. Jenkins," he said, turning to the injured Corporal, "you stay in the middle." He next addressed Ashley as he moved up next to her, "Williams, lead on."

As the group moved out from the dig-site, Shepard lowered his voice, whispering to Ashley: "You were with this guy for how long?"

Ashley wasn't sure about the Commander's tone. She decided to respond truthfully. "About fifteen, twenty minutes. He was...helpful."

Shepard snorted lightly. "I don't know how you didn't shoot him."

Ashley responded with a soft chuckle. "It was a near thing, Commander."

It was a short hike up the ridge. Even with Jenkins and his injury showing them down, the group made it in only a few minutes.

The scene that greeted them was depressing, to say the least. Small fires were burning here and there. Most of the prefab buildings that made up the science camp were clustered off to the right, and each one was damaged to some extent.

And then there were the bodies.

The soldiers were bad enough; the bodies of several Marines were scattered about the clearing. The bodies of the civilians mixed in with them was what struck the group as especially grotesque. Most of them had the tell-tale markings of geth pulse-fire, but a few had far more frightening injuries.

Ashley was the first to approach one of the bodies. "What the hell?"

"What is it, Williams?" Shepard asked without taking his attention away from scanning the perimeter.

"I...I'm not sure, Commander," she said as she tried to inspect the body before her without looking too closely. "It looks like they've been..."

When she trailed off again, McTaggart crouched down next to her. "Looks like the poor sod's been ripped apart, bossman. Possibly even..." He pointed out a particular injury to Ashley and asked, "Do those look like teeth marks to ye, Chief?"

Jenkins spoke up at that remark, his voice noticeably shaky. "T-teeth marks? But the geth don't have teeth."

McTaggart pushed himself back to his feet and offered an unwelcome hand to Ashley. "Must've' been something else what got 'em, then," he replied to the Corporal with a shrug.

Ashley got to her feet without McTaggart's help. She glanced around the camp as she brushed off her hands. "I don't see the beacon."

Shepard shook his head. "I don't, either. It's looking more likely that the geth were the ones who moved it from the dig-site."

"Guys," Alenko called from off to the left. "There's more of those spikes over here."

Shepard was the first to make it to Alenko's side, but the rest were close behind. The sight that met their eyes was one that they would see in their nightmares for years to come.

There were five spikes in total, spaced evenly along the left-hand side of the camp. But it wasn't the spikes themselves that had caught Alenko's attention. Speared on each one of them was a human body. Whether they were civilian or soldier was impossible to tell.

"What did the geth do to them?" Ashley asked, horror evident in her voice. The bodies barely looked human anymore. They were desiccated, hardly more than skin and bones. Their skin was grey and stretched tight over their skeletons. All trace of clothing had disappeared, and the blue lights of cybernetics glowed from various points.

"I don't know, Chief," was Shepard's soft reply. Ashley could see that the Commander was just as horrified as the rest, but the steel in his jaw told her that he had seen things just as bad before. She wondered what that could have been...

Behind the rest of the group, Jenkins quietly threw up. Ashley figured that it was the pain from his injury that had caused it, as much as the sight in front of him. But she knew that didn't make it any easier.

McTaggart took a step closer and raised his omni-tool. "I don't know about ye, but I think this goes beyond psychological warfare. Don't ye, Chief?"

Ashley remembered the conversation she'd had with the freelancer the first time they'd seen the spikes. Something sparked another memory, one from her childhood. "Dragon's Teeth..."

Shepard gave her a look. "What was that, Williams?"

Ashley shook her head. "It's... just a story I remember from when I was a kid. Jason and the Argonauts. Jason had to sow a field with a dragon's teeth. When he did, soldiers sprang from the field to fight against him." She shook her head again. "It's stupid, I know. They just made me think of that," she said, gesturing at the impaled bodies.

Just as she finished speaking, there was a sound that was more felt than heard. Each of the five bodies twitched, and the spikes began to retract.

"Well crap, Chief," McTaggart shouted as he drew his pistol with his left hand. He had the presence of mind to continue scanning with the omni-tool on his right. "Why'd ye have t' go and say something like that?"

The spikes retracted all the way, allowing the bodies' feet to touch the ground. At the contact, they pushed themselves off of the tip of the spikes and levered themselves upright.

"Oh, God! They're still alive!" Alenko cried as he drew his own sidearm.

Shepard drew his pistol but didn't fire. He waited to see just what was going to happen next. "Not quite," he replied grimly. "They look more like husks than actual people."

It was at that moment that the Husks spotted the five soldiers. An ear-piercing howl emanated from five inhuman throats, and the Husks darted for the group.

"Open fire!" Shepard shouted, less than a second before McTaggart did just that.

Three pistols, and Ashley's and Jenkins' assault rifles tore into the charging Husks. Ashley's, Alenko's, and Jenkins' fire was a little erratic, their fear throwing off their aims. But Shepard and McTaggart were scarily accurate.

Shepard sent three slugs in quick succession into his target's chest. Rather than putting the creature down, the impacts only made it stumble as a blue shimmer flickered around it. It recovered its balance and continued charging, letting out another howl.

"Ye have t' be kidding me!" McTaggart cried. "Zombies with shields?!"

Shepard quickly activated his phasic app, making sure that the blue light flickered on the side of his pistol. Then he shifted his aim and fired three rounds into the thing's head. The first slug was stopped by the thing's shields, but the second punched through the weakened barrier to ricochet off the Husk's brow. Before it could even flinch, his third shot went right through the thing's left eye. Its feet went out from under it as it collapsed, skidding along the grass.

McTaggart had taken a slightly different approach. With his omni-tool recording the results, the freelancer sent three phasic rounds into the Husk's chest, knocking out its shields. He then fired a single round into each of his Husk's limbs: the slugs in its arms didn't seem to bother it at all, while the ones in its legs only made it stumble. He sent another two rounds into its torso and recorded the results of that, as well. Once he had all the information he wanted, McTaggart sent three rounds rapid-fire into the Husk's skull, blowing it apart and leaving the rest of the corpse to tumble to the ground.

Ashley swallowed her fear enough to notice what Shepard and McTaggart were doing. She took a pause in her firing, long enough to take a breath and activate her own phasic app. She refocused her fire on her target's head. A quick, solid burst blew it off. As it collapsed, she pivoted and did the same to Alenko's Husk.

The silence that followed was deafening. Jenkins had managed to take his target down through sheer volume of fire; the cybernetic corpse didn't look like much more than a pile of meat and metal. The Corporal was breathing heavily and making a visible effort to keep from throwing up again.

"Is everybody okay?" Shepard asked after making sure that the Husks were dead.

Alenko nodded as he clipped his pistol to his hip. "Aye, Commander. I'm good."

Ashley echoed the Lieutenant's sentiment with a nod. She was not quick to put up her weapon. Instead, she panned around the camp, her eye to the scope of her rifle. She was not going to be caught in another ambush.

Shepard turned to Jenkins. "Jenkins, what about you?"

It took the young soldier a moment to catch his breath. When he had, he gave Shepard a hesitant nod. "Y-yeah, I'm... I'm good, Commander. Just didn't expect to find that here."

McTaggart snorted at that. "No kidding! I don't think anyone expected that! I know I sure didn't when I landed this morning."

Shepard frowned at the freelancer. "You're not helping." He gestured at the man's omni-tool and asked, "Did you learn anything from your little experiment?"

McTaggart instantly refocused on his readout. "Well I'm nary a medical man," he began with a shrug. "But by my reckoning, these... 'Dragon's Teeth' can only have been here for... what?" He glanced at Ashley before continuing, "twenty-five t' thirty minutes. Certainly less than an hour. Does that seem like enough time t' implant this level o' cybernetics?"

The freelancer keyed his omni-tool to display a hologram of his scans, and Alenko immediately stepped closer to take a look. "You're right. This shouldn't be possible..."

"Well," McTaggart replied with a smirk, "we are dealing with three-hundred-year-old sentient machines. Maybe that word doesn't mean quite what ye were thinking it means."

Ashley wanted to slap McTaggart for the Lieutenant, but Alenko was so engrossed in the scan that he didn't seem to notice the man's sarcasm. She shot the freelancer a glare, but he just grinned and winked at her. With a growl, she turned away before she could be overcome by yet another urge to shoot the infuriating man.

Jenkins was standing a couple of steps away from the rest of the group. He had his hands on his knees, doing his best to keep his stomach from rebelling. "You okay, Jenkins?" she quietly asked him. When he only nodded, she crouched down next to him. "It's okay to be freaked out, Corp. I don't know about you," she added with a tight grin, "but nothing in my training prepared me for cyber-zombies."

Jenkins responded with a snort of laughter. "Yeah, neither did mine." He took another breath before straightening up. Gesturing at the corpses and the Dragon's Teeth behind, he asked her: "Why would synthetics even think to use something like that?"

Ashley was surprised at the kid's question. She hadn't realized that the very same question had been buzzing around in the back of her mind. "That's a good question, Corp," she told him.

Before she could say more, McTaggart transferred his scans to Lieutenant Alenko's omni-tool and walked over to join her and Jenkins. He was smiling, but Ashley didn't quite trust it…

"Corporal, is it?" McTaggart asked, glancing at Jenkins' insignia. He held out his hand and said, "Sorry, we weren't formally introduced. Name's John McTaggart. Friends call me Tag."

Ashley was watching to see the kid's reaction to the freelancer. When she saw the flash of suspicion in his eyes as he shook McTaggart's hand, she was relieved to see that Jenkins wasn't as innocent as he seemed.

"Richard Jenkins. Nice to meet you, McTaggart," Jenkins replied. He grimaced slightly when McTaggart's firm handshake pulled at his wounded side.

"Ouch. That looks right nasty," McTaggart said, tilting his head to get a better look. "Pulse-fire? What happened?"

For some reason, Ashley was surprised to see genuine concern in the freelancer's expression. His off-the-cuff attitude had left her thinking that he was incapable of empathizing. She was left wondering how she felt about that.

"Walked into an ambush just after we landed. I was the point-man; rounded a corner and got surprised by a geth Drone."

Ashley caught the flicker of surprise on McTaggart's face. "Really? Just the one?" He shook his head quickly and added: "It seems t' me that they usually fly in pairs…" She wondered what had the freelancer so worried about the discrepancy.

Jenkins shrugged. "I don't know about that. There was just the one that time." He was doing his best to dismiss the injury, but McTaggart wouldn't let it go.

"Look, boyo. There's nothing t' be ashamed of when ye take a shot like that. Scars are t' remind us that we're human. I've more than a fair share, meself." He leaned in slightly and added in a mock-whisper: "Plus, the little lasses love a man with scars. Right Chief?"

Ashley gave him a look and walked away. "If you say so, McTaggart." She wasn't about to let the infuriating freelancer get under her skin.

Alenko was still engrossed in McTaggart's scans, so she looked around for Shepard. She found him over by the Dragon's Teeth, contemplating something. She walked up, making sure to make enough noise that she didn't startle him. "What's on your mind, Commander?"

Shepard snapped out his reverie and glanced over as she stepped up next to him. "I'm wondering what possible use synthetics like the geth would have for these...Dragon's Teeth. That's a good name, by the way."

"Thanks," she replied with a small grin. She was surprised by how good that one comment from the Commander made her feel, and she was quick to clamp down on it. After all, they were still in the middle of hell.

Not to mention that you just met the guy! she told herself.

She mentally shook herself, saying, "Jenkins was wondering the same thing. About why the geth would use these things."

Shepard smiled at that. "Richard is a good kid. Got to say, it scared me when he got jumped by that Drone. I shouldn't have sent him out in the open like that."

Ashley was already shaking her head before he'd even finished speaking. "I don't know, Commander; I wasn't there. But that kid is a Marine. He'd never forgive you if you babied him. And it'd get him killed a whole lot sooner, too."

Shepard snorted at that. "Yeah, probably." He was silent for a moment. Then he shrugged, shook his head to clear it, and said, "Let's move on, shall we?"

"Sure thing, Commander," she replied with a nod. "Where to next?"

Shepard looked around the camp again. His gaze lingered on a glowing red door control. He nodded in that direction and headed over. "Looks like someone might have escaped this massacre." He caught Alenko's eye and waved for him to follow. "Jenkins, McTaggart: look sharp! We're going to check that building. McTaggart, stack left. Kaidan, stack right and crack the lock. Jenkins, I want you to hold back. Williams, I'm going to go in first; stay on my six."

The team fell into position. Alenko quickly hacked the lock but waited for Shepard's signal to key the last command. Shepard took one final breath, then gave Alenko the go-ahead. The Lieutenant replied with a nod before tapping in the final command. The lock flipped to green and Alenko keyed the door open.

Shepard was in motion before the door had completely opened. Ashley was right on his heels. She didn't know if he was expecting trouble, but, if it had been her in charge, she wouldn't have been taking any chances.

The prefab lab they burst into was laid out all to the right of the door. Ashley and Shepard were inside and sweeping the interior with their eyes to their scopes before McTaggart and Alenko piled in behind them. Jenkins was last in, but there was no need.

Two figures greeted them, both with hands raised and clad in lab smocks. Ashley let out a breath she hadn't been aware she'd been holding as she lowered her rifle.

"Thank the Maker! Humans!" cried the female scientist. She was middle-aged, but her hair was still dark red, and her eyes were bright. Though her demeanor was tempered by the ordeal she'd been through.

The older man to her left wasn't doing as well, though. "Hurry! Close the door! Before they come back!"

Shepard stowed his rifle and held up his empty hands. "Don't worry. We'll protect you."

The woman sighed and nodded appreciatively. "Thank you. I think we'll be okay now. It looks like everyone's gone."

Ashley had put up her own rifle along with Shepard. Suddenly she snapped her fingers. "You're Doctor Warren, the one in charge of the excavation."

"Yes, that's me," Doctor Warren replied with a dip of her chin. "I'm sorry, but I don't recall your name."

"I'm Ashley Williams, with the Two-Twelve." Before she could get bogged down in bad memories, she cleared her throat and said, "And this is Commander Shepard of the Normandy. He and his team are here looking for the beacon your team dug up. It wasn't at the dig site. Do you know what happened to it?"

"It was moved to the spaceport this morning. Manuel and I," she said, gesturing to the fidgety man standing next to her, "stayed behind to help pack up the camp. When the attack came, the Marines held them off long enough for us to hide. They gave their lives to save us," she added with a sad shake of her head.

Manuel shook his head jerkily and spoke up in a high-pitched and shaky voice. "No one is saved! The age of humanity is ended. Soon, only ruin and corpses will remain."

The whole team turned to give the odd little man a concerned look. McTaggart leaned forward to mock-whisper: "This guy is nay coping well, boss."

Shepard nodded in agreement, but he nudged the freelancer back with his elbow. "Why don't you and Jenkins wait outside. It's a little crowded in here, and I think it might be too much for the good Doctor."

"Right ye are, bossman. Ye heard the man, boyo," McTaggart said as he turned Jenkins around and pushed him towards the door. "Let's go make sure that there are no more o' those nasty cyber-zombies sneaking up on us."

Once the two men were gone, Shepard turned back to the Doctors. "Sorry about him. We just picked him up a few minutes ago."

Doctor Warren dipped her head graciously. "That's quite alright, Commander."

"What else can you tell us about the attack?" Shepard wanted to know.

"It all happened so fast," the Doctor replied with a shake of her head. "One second we were gathering up our equipment. The next we were hiding in here while the geth swarmed over the camp. Can you imagine? Geth, outside the Veil!"

Before Shepard could reply, Manuel spoke up again. "Agents of the destroyers. Bringers of darkness. Heralds of our extinction!"

Doctor Warren shook her head at her colleague's outburst but ignored it beyond that. "We could hear the battle outside," she said, turning back to Shepard. "Gunfire. Screams. I thought it would never end. Then everything went quiet. We just sat here, too afraid to move. Until you came along, that is."

Alenko had a question, then. "Did you notice a turian in the area?"

Manuel's eyes lit up at that. He nodded vigorously and took a half-step forward, causing the team to take one backward. "I saw him. The prophet! Leader of the enemy! He was here, before the attack."

Alenko frowned at that. "That's impossible," he said to Shepard. "Nihlus was with us on the Normandy before the attack. He couldn't have been here."

Shepard agreed, "You're right. Something's not right here."

Doctor Warren cut in apologetically. "I'm sorry. Manuel's still a bit...unsettled. We haven't seen your turian. We've been hiding in here since the attack began."

Manuel was giving Ashley the creeps. She wanted to be out of there as soon as possible. She asked Doctor Warren: "What can you tell us about the beacon?"

Doctor Warren shrugged, her eyes lighting up at the chance to talk about her project. "It's some kind of data module from a galaxy-wide communications network. Remarkably well preserved. It could be the greatest scientific discovery of our lifetime! Miraculous technologies. Groundbreaking medical advances. Who knows what secrets are locked inside?"

That made Manuel even more nervous. He pulled at his ear and stuttered: "W-we have unearthed the heart of evil! Awakened the beast. Unleashed the darkness!"

Doctor Warren had finally had enough, much to Ashley's relief. "Manuel! Please! This isn't the time."

Shepard frowned, thinking twice before he asked anyway. "What's wrong with your assistant?"

Doctor Warren appeared reluctant to answer. "Manuel has a brilliant mind, but...he's always been a bit...unstable. Genius and madness are two sides of the same coin."

Manuel scoffed, though his voice was still edging into the high pitches of insanity. "Is it madness to see the future? To see the destruction rushing towards us? To understand there is no escape? No hope? No! I am not mad. I am the only sane one left!"

Doctor Warren sighed, rubbing the bridge of her nose between two fingers. She looked up, noticing the team's concerned expressions, particularly Ashley's freaked out one. "Don't worry, dear. I gave him an extra dose of his meds after the attack. They should be starting to work soon."

Shepard nodded slowly, unwilling to leave the Doctor with her unstable colleague. "Are you sure he's going to be okay?"

Doctor Warren nodded, smiling thankfully at Shepard's concern. "Yes, Commander. We've worked together a long time; I know how to handle his moods."

"Okay then," Shepard replied. He turned to Ashley. "Williams, take us to the spaceport. We've got to retrieve that beacon before the geth do."

Before the team could move, Manuel had one last parting piece of advice. "You can't stop it! Nobody can stop it. Night is falling. The darkness of eternity."

Doctor Warren put her arm around the distraught Manuel's shoulders and turned him towards a chair. "Hush, Manuel. Come sit down. You'll feel better once the medication kicks in."

Ashley followed Alenko and Shepard out of the lab. Once her feet were on grass and the door had slid closed behind them, she gave in to a full body shudder. "GAH! That guy gives me the creeps!"

McTaggart grinned from where he was leaning back against the building. "Did ol' 'Doom and Gloom' get worse?"

Ashley responded with an emphatic nod and another shiver. Shepard was the one who answered. "Yeah. I'm afraid that Manuel may have had more than he can recover from."

"Too bad," McTaggart replied, straightening up. "I 'eard he's one o' the best xeno-archeologists this side o' Arcturus. Maybe fiddlin' with alien tech all these years wasn't such a good idea, huh?" he added. After a moment's contemplation, he shrugged and addressed Shepard: "What's the plan now, bossman?"

"Doctor Warren said that they moved the beacon to the spaceport this morning," Shepard said by way of reply. "It's vital that we reach it before the geth do. Ashley," he said, turning to her, "how far is the spaceport from here?"

Ashley hesitated, her surprise at hearing Shepard say her given name for the first time throwing her off. She hadn't thought that it would've sounded that good...

Shake it off, Williams! You're a soldier, and he's on a mission; he's barely aware that you're a woman.

"I- um, it's..." she stammered as she looked around, both to get her bearings and to distract herself from the fact that Shepard was looking at her. "It's down that trail," she said, pointing off to the right. "About half a mile."

"Alright," Shepard said with a nod as he drew his rifle again. "The beacon is still our priority, and it's becoming increasingly likely that the geth are already in possession of it. We cannot allow them to destroy it or take it off-world. Jenkins, are you still doing okay? How's your wound?"

Jenkins tried to downplay his injury, but Shepard wasn't easily fooled. Ashley noted the quiver in his voice as he replied: "It-it's fine, Commander. I'm good."

Shepard frowned when he saw Jenkins wobble slightly on his feet. "Corporal, now's not the time for heroics." He turned to Alenko then, saying, "Check him out, Kaidan. Ashley, McTaggart: keep an eye on the perimeter. We don't want the geth - or more of those Husks - sneaking up on us."

"Aye aye, bossman."

Ashley seconded McTaggart's affirmation. She shared a worried glance with the freelancer and was surprised to see it returned. She had had the feeling that Jenkins was hurt worse than he was letting on. On the one hand, she didn't blame him: no Marine liked to admit that they were a liability. But on the other, if their Commander didn't know the state of his team, he couldn't command them properly.

After a few minutes, she heard Alenko make his report to Shepard. "That Drone did more damage than we thought, Shepard. The medi-gel I gave him then did it's job on his primary injury, but he cracked two ribs when he dove into cover, and he has several burns where the pulse-fire didn't quite penetrate his armor. The painkillers were wearing off, and he's exhausted, but he should be okay now. I gave him another dose of medi-gel and a stimulant to keep him moving."

Shepard didn't look happy, but he nodded. "Thanks, Kaidan. Why don't you stick close to him for the remainder of the mission? Williams and McTaggart seem capable enough; I'll keep them on point. You and Jenkins can cover our rear."

"Aye aye, Commander," Alenko responded with a nod before moving back to Jenkins.

Ashley turned when she heard Shepard approaching. "How's Jenkins?"

Shepard's jaw tightened slightly, but he said, "He'll be fine, once we get him back to the Normandy. He's a tough kid, but the geth beat him up pretty bad. Kaidan patched him up and is going to stay with him. I need you and McTaggart to run point with me." Before he continued, he waved the freelancer over. "You two are going to stay with me," he said once McTaggart jogged over. "Kaidan and Jenkins are going to cover our rear. McTaggart, you're a tech, yes?" When the man nodded, Shepard asked: "Engineer or Infiltrator?"

McTaggart took a second too long to reply. At the Commander's impatient expression, he shrugged. "Um...aye? I can pretty much do whate'er needs doing. My omni-tool's custom-modded with just about any app ye could possibly need. Even have a couple of prototypes that I've managed to get me hands on."

Shepard looked as curious as Ashley felt. Before she could open her mouth to ask, she thought better of it. It was probably best if she didn't know where he'd gotten hold of his "prototypes."

"Okay," Shepard replied with a sharp nod. "From what Williams tells me, you're a quick thinker and good at getting out of tight spots. I need you to follow my orders to the letter from here on in. Is that going to be a problem?"

McTaggart barely suppressed a grin, but he managed to sober up and give an almost believable nod. "Nay, Commander. Ye say 'jump,' I'll go as high as I can."

"Good," Shepard replied with a nod and a small grin. "Williams," he continued, turning back to her, "You're on point. Lead us to the spaceport. McTaggart will have your six, and I'll be covering you both." He drew his sniper rifle from over his left shoulder and activated a phasic app as it unfolded. "Move fast, shoot straight, and get us to that beacon."

"Aye aye, Skipper!" Ashley responded with an enthusiastic salute. She drew her assault rifle and activated her own phasic app as she jogged over to the trailhead. McTaggart joined her a moment later, an amused look on his face. She shot him a frown and asked: "What?"

McTaggart shrugged, trying too hard to appear nonchalant. "Oh, nothing. The Commander is quite the, uh...inspiring speaker, don't ye think?"

Ashley felt a blush blossom instantly on her cheeks. She ducked her head, ostensibly to check her rifle. The true meaning behind McTaggart's comment was evident on his grinning face, and it infuriated her because she was afraid that it hit too close to the truth. She had slowly been getting used to the aggravating freelancer, but, with that one comment, every ounce of it came flooding back. She gritted her teeth and pushed past him. "Come on. We've got a job to do."

Ashley led the team down the trail. Every sense was alert to a possible ambush. She did her best to ignore the maelstrom of emotions stirred up by McTaggart's comment. She did feel something for Commander Shepard, but two things kept her from dwelling on it.

One: she had only just met him. They hadn't had anything even remotely resembling a real conversation.

Two: they were in the middle of an invasion of a farming colony by three-centuries-old synthetics from outer space! Now was not the time to get distracted by feelings.

Once more, she wished that she'd given in and shot McTaggart when they'd first met. Nothing serious, of course. Just a flesh wound, maybe...

"Spaceport is just on the other side of this cleft," she whispered into the comm a few minutes later.

Shepard's voice came back just as softly. "Keep moving. Tell me when you've got eyes on the spaceport. Do not engage until I give the order."

Ashley nodded to herself as she adjusted her grip on her rifle. Ash was floating down, settling on every available surface. Including her helmet and shoulders. She tried not to think about the fact that her home for the last eight months was burning, and people she had come to know were dying. As an afterthought, she closed the breather on her helmet; she realized that everybody else had already done so.

Just before she rounded the final corner, a solitary gunshot rang out in the distance. Ashley skidded to a halt, throwing up her fist to signal the others. "What was that?" she asked.

McTaggart was right next to her. He shook his head, bringing up his omni-tool and checking a scanner. "Nary a clue. Sounds like it came from the spaceport. Ye'd think that there would've been more of 'em."

Shepard joined them, waving for Alenko and Jenkins to hold back. "Whatever it was, we need to move." He motioned for them to keep moving with a nod before waving Alenko and Jenkins to move up.

Ashley nodded and moved quickly but carefully out into the open. The spaceport came into view on their right: the side that they were approaching from was the shipping area, where loads were sent off to the rest of the colony. A ramp led down from the facility onto a dirt trail that headed off towards town. Now, though, the field between the team and the spaceport was strewn with Dragon's Teeth.

"Commander!" she hissed over the comm. "The geth have control of the spaceport!"

"It's alright," came Shepard's calm reply. "Just stay focused on the objective. Can you see the beacon?"

She cast around, then shook her head. "Negative. The beacon is not on the loading platform."

Before Shepard could respond, McTaggart cut in. "There are geth Troopers patrolling the loading platform, boss. Not just those Husks."

"Have they spotted you yet?"

"Nay. But," the freelancer added after a moment's silence, a grin in his voice, "there're three of 'em huddled 'round an IED."

"I see it," Shepard replied as he joined the two behind their cover. He grinned, showing perfect white teeth. "Let's let them know we're here," he said as he pressed his eye to his rifle's scope.

The Commander took a breath, held it, and pulled the trigger. From Ashley's position - right next to Shepard - the report of his rifle was incredibly loud. But the resulting explosion was far more spectacular. The three Troopers were thrown away with surprising force; one of them was little more than scrap, blown apart by the force of the explosion. The other two fared only slightly better, but both were completely defunct by the time they finished bouncing.

"Nice!" McTaggart hissed with a grin. "That'll teach the synthetic bastards!"

Ashley couldn't help but grin, as well. She glanced back to see mirth in Shepard's blue eyes, shining through his visor, and she was momentarily stunned by the sight. It was only the Commander's words, telling her to move out - and McTaggart's thumping her on the shoulder when she lagged behind - that snapped her out of it. She cleared her head with a sharp shake and set off down the hill behind the freelancer.

Unfortunately, the three geth had several friends that were not conveniently standing next to an IED. The remaining Troopers opened fire as the team came down the hill, their pulse-fire throwing up chunks of burning grass and scorched dirt.

Ashley sprinted to the nearest cover: a large boulder in the middle of the otherwise empty hillside. Planting her shoulder against the rock, she spun out to the left and sighted down on a Trooper that was trying to flank her. A solid burst from her rifle - augmented by a phasic app - drove the synthetic into cover. But not before her shots knocked down its shields and took chunks from its shoulder.

"Rocket!" came Shepard's warning shout over the comm.

Ashley ducked back behind her rock just as a rocket screamed through the space her head had just vacated. Whew! That was close!

"Keep your heads down!" Shepard called out. She looked back up the hill to see the Commander drop to a knee and throw his Mantis to his shoulder. He was completely out in the open, no cover whatsoever. Long range pulse-fire struck all around him, with a few lucky shots pinging off his shields. He put his eye to his sights, steadied his aim, and pulled the trigger.

McTaggart's sharp laugh signaled that Shepard's aim had been true. Ashley allowed herself a grin before leaning back out to open fire again. Suddenly, there was that sound again: felt, more than heard, like an enormous subsonic gong.

"The Dragon's Teeth are active!" shouted McTaggart as he took down a Trooper that was too slow making it back to cover.

"Steady, team!" shouted back Shepard. "Keep together and lay down covering fire. Remember: they have shields!"

A moment later, McTaggart joined Ashley behind her rock. "Here comes the horde o' cybernetic zombies. Ye ready, Chief?" he asked, swapping his pistol for his assault rifle.

Ashley did her best to ignore his banter. She just nodded and spun out to the left, trusting McTaggart to do the same on the other side.

The Husks came howling. Every trace of who they used to be was wiped away, replaced by the same gruesome and twisted visage of cybernetically augmented rage. Her and McTaggart's crossfire cut into the howling horde. Their shots ricocheted off shields to begin with but quickly began to find their way through. Technologically reanimated corpses started falling, cut down by mass-accelerator fire, but there were still more.

More mass-accelerator fire poured down from the top of the hill: Alenko and Jenkins had joined the fight. With the whole team together again, Shepard called out: "Point team: move up. Push through and secure the loading bay. We've got your back." He punctuated his order by putting another sniper round through a Husk's head.

"McTaggart?" Ashley called out. From her right, the freelancer replied: "With ye, Chief! Run for it!"

With a grim nod, Ashley took off at a run. She headed straight down the hill, directly into the howling teeth of the horde. The first Husk, she tore apart with rifle-fire. But the one behind it used its partner for cover, the first one's body eating up Ashley's fire before it could hit. Her fire ripped away the thing's shields, and then it was on her.

Ashley clubbed the charging Husk down with the butt of her rifle without breaking stride. The corpse dropped to the ground with a crushed skull, and Ashley opened fire on the next Husk in line.

Suddenly, a white orb zipped in from her right, trailing flakes of... snow? Its trajectory curved as it tracked a Husk, then flattened out and hit the animated corpse full in the chest. The orb shattered and the Hush froze solid in its tracks, its grey skin turning to ice.

"Leave it be!" shouted McTaggart as he hosed a small group of charging Husks with rifle-fire. His shots herded the group closer to their frozen companion. When they were close enough, he launched another omni-tool app. This one resembled a glowing fireball. It hit the frozen Husk and exploded, shattering the Husk. The group that McTaggart had herded close were hit by flying chunks of their compatriot. McTaggart laughed and put the group down for good with his rifle.

Ashley opened her mouth, but before she could say anything, Shepard called out: "Rocket!"

Her head snapped around, eyes searching. There it was. Heading right for her. She skidded to a stop. Instinct told her to dive away, but training took over. There was no way she could get far enough fast enough. At the last second, she triggered her Shield Boost, and the rocket hit the ground right in front of her.

The next thing she knew, she was airborne. The ground knocked the wind out of her, and her rifle went spinning off.

"Incoming!"

Shepard's shout jolted her out of her daze. She looked up to see the second rocket. There was no dodging it, and her shields were depleted. She saw Shepard take down the Rocket Trooper with a well-placed shot. But that still left the incoming rocket. Her eyes went wide and she braced herself for the inevitable.

McTaggart appeared from out of nowhere. He crouched over her with his arm raised, as though to shield her from the rocket. His omni-tool flashed, and a glowing orange shield appeared. He angled it just so and braced himself.

"This is gonna be loud!" he exclaimed, turning his head away.

The rocket hit the freelancer's omni-shield. The explosion was deafening, but the angle of McTaggart's shield shunted the worst of the force upwards, away from the two of them. The impact knocked McTaggart down on top of Ashley with a grunt, but that was the worst of it.

Before she could react, McTaggart jumped off of her, snatching his pistol from his hip. Only then did she see the three Husks charging towards them. They were already only a handful of paces away. McTaggart didn't hesitate.

Bang, bang, bang.

Center, right, left: he shot each Husk in the face. Before they had a chance to recover, he shot the ones on either side again.

Bang, bang.

Cybernetic brain matter splattered on the grass, but the final Husk was right on top of him.

Bang!

Shepard's shot took the final Husk's head clean off. McTaggart spun around with a laugh and flipped him a two-fingered salute.

"Thanks, bossman!"

Shepard came down the hill with a heavy frown. "What the hell was that?"

McTaggart's cheerful expression barely flickered. He helped Ashley to her feet and handed back her rifle.

"I knew ye had me back, Commander." He turned back to Ashley. "Ye okay, Chief?"

Ashley shook her head, trying to clear the cobwebs. "Yeah, I'm fine. Thought I was dead for sure. How'd you do that? I've never seen anybody move that fast."

McTaggart shrugged as the rest of the team joined them. "I've a custom mod that's linked to my targeting software and takes control of the electro-muscles in my armor."

Shepard, Alenko, and Jenkins caught up with McTaggart and Ashley. "Looks like we cleared out the lot of 'em, bossman," the freelancer said, looking around. His eyes lit on a group of storage sheds set back several yards from the loading bay. He pointed, saying: "Ye think more survivors have locked themselves in there?"

Shepard followed his finger. The door control was glowing red: locked. He frowned. "The survivors here need help. But our mission is to secure the beacon." He took another moment, then shook his head. "Let's keep moving."

Ashley gripped her rifle and, at Shepard's signal, led the group up the ramp onto the loading bay. It was more of a platform, open on all sides and without even an awning. Cargo crates of all sizes were stacked, awaiting pickup that would probably never come now. Here and there, fires were still burning. Ashley checked them but saw that they would soon burn themselves out.

She was surprised to not find any bodies. Then she remembered the horde of Husks they had just fought outside. She swept the area with her eye to her rifle sights, scanning for any threat; McTaggart was beside her, pistol held in a loose left-handed grip as he waved his omni-tool around.

Shepard stepped up the ramp behind them, sweeping his rifle from side to side. "Looks like we already ran into all the dock workers," he muttered grimly.

Alenko came up behind him, with Jenkins following close. "No sign of the beacon. I'm starting to get the feeling that someone is toying with us, Commander."

Shepard replied with a nod. "Fan out. Keep your weapons ready."

A few moments later, Alenko called out from the back of the loading bay.

"Commander! I found Nihlus!"

The whole group hustled over to the Lieutenant's position. Alenko was crouching over a turian body. It was subtle, but Ashley saw Shepard sag somewhat.

"Is he...?"

Alenko nodded grimly at the Commander's unfinished question. "Looks like a single gunshot to the back of the head."

McTaggart snapped his fingers. "Oi! Remember that shot we heard on the way over?"

Before anybody could reply, movement caught Ashley's eye. "Something's moving! Over behind those crates!"

Three pistols, an assault rifle, and a shotgun were unshipped in an instant.

"Get out here! Now!" Shepard wasn't in the best of moods. Ashley didn't want to see him angry.

A human form detached itself from the shadow of a stack of crates and stepped into the light, hands raised with the eagerness of one who doesn't want to get shot. "Wait! Don't-Don't shoot! I'm one of you! I'm human!"

Shepard's grip on his shotgun relaxed somewhat, but his was the only one. "Sneaking up on us like that almost got you killed!"

The dockworker was trembling so hard, Ashley was afraid that he was going to do something stupid. With four itchy trigger fingers pointed in his direction, that was a seriously bad idea.

He waved his hands frantically, trying desperately to look like he wasn't going for a weapon. "I-I'm sorry! I was hiding. From those creatures..." Realizing that the heavily armed group pointing weapons at him were at least going to let him talk first, the guy finally got something of a grip on himself. He paused and took a breath. Letting it out, he continued in a much calmer voice.

"My name's Powell. I saw what happened to that turian," he said, pointing at Nihlus' body. "The other one shot him."

Ashley was as surprised as everyone else. She frowned, throwing a glance at Shepard. He looked just as confused as she felt.

With a frown of his own, he holstered his shotgun and motioned for everyone else to do the same. "I need to know what happened to Nihlus. What 'other one' shot him?"

Powell took another breath. Now that all of the weapons were put away, he was much more relaxed. "The other turian. He got here first. He was waiting when your friend showed up. Your friend (Nihlus?) called him 'Saren.' I think they knew each other. Your friend seemed to relax. They talked for a minute, and he let his guard down...and Saren killed him! Shot him right in the back."

Ashley immediately thought of the "prophet" that Manuel had mentioned when Alenko had asked about Nihlus. If there really was a turian leading the geth...but that doesn't make any sense; the geth have killed every organic they've encountered in the last three-hundred years. Why would they have spared this Saren, let alone followed him?

Shepard seemed to be pondering over the same things. He gritted his teeth and asked, "What happened after he killed Nihlus?"

Powell pointed further along the loading platform. "He hopped on the cargo train. Probably headed over to that damn beacon. It's over on the other platform. I knew that beacon was trouble!" He said, slamming a fist into an open palm. "Everything's gone to hell since we found it. First, that damn mother ship showed up. Then the attack. They killed everyone. Everyone!" he finished with a sad headshake.

Holding out a hand for Powell to calm down, Shepard changed subjects. "Is there anything else you can tell me about the beacon?"

Powell shook his head with a shrug. "Not really. They brought it here this morning. We loaded it up onto the train and shipped it to the other platform. That's where we load outgoing stuff onto the ships." He shook his head again, eyes wide and staring. "Hard to believe that was only a few hours ago. Feels like a whole other life."

Shepard let the silence hang for a moment. Ashley glanced over at him, trying to gauge what he was thinking. The Commander's face was hard to read, though; she didn't know if he was truly concerned about Powell, or was just trying to get information out of him.

Something about this guy was rubbing her wrong. Something about the way he had been acting when they'd caught him lurking was tickling her subconscious. It was like he was hiding something, but she couldn't put her finger on it.

Shepard finally broke the silence to ask: "What can you tell me about the attack?"

Powell shook his head like he didn't want to remember. But he told Shepard what he wanted to know. "It was quick. One minute, that ship was descending. The next, those synthetics were swarming over the platform, thousands of them. They must have been inside that mother ship. They shot anything that moved. It was a massacre."

That piqued Shepard's interest. "Tell me about this 'mother ship' you saw."

As Powell began to speak, Ashley thought back to the brief glimpse she'd had of the geth ship. Huge, monstrous, and shaped like the hand of a giant devil coming down from the sky, it had been dark purple - almost black - and wreathed in angry red lightning. She had never seen anything like it in her life, and she never wanted to see it again.

"I've never seen anything like it before," Powell said, unknowingly echoing Ashley's sentiments. "It...it was huge. Landed over near that platform," he said, pointing in the same direction he had indicated Saren had gone. "The whole place got dark as it came down. And it was making this noise, this...this sound that bored right into your brain. That's what woke me up. The attack came a few minutes later."

McTaggart was waving his hands wildly even before Powell had finished speaking. "Whoa, whoa, whoa! 'Woke ye up'? Ye were sleeping? I thought ye said ye were working here on the docks."

Shepard looked back at Powell. His eyes narrowed as he fixed the dockworker with a fierce glare. "Explain yourself, Powell. What were you doing when the attack came?"

Ashley thought Powell was about to argue with the Commander. But he wasn't stupid enough to underestimate how quickly the five armed people in front of him would catch him if he lied. He sagged and fixed Shepard with pleading eyes. "I...sometimes, I need a nap to get through my shift. I sneak off behind the crates to grab forty winks where the supervisor can't find me. That's why the synthetics didn't find me; I was already behind the crates when the attack came." He hung his head and added: "Nobody else had time to hide once it started."

The sheer unfairness of the situation enraged Ashley. "You mean you survived because you were lazy?!"

Much to Ashley's satisfaction, Powell appeared to be terrified by her reaction. Before he could say anything, Shepard raised a hand and said: "Calm down, Williams. At least this way we have an eyewitness."

Ashley gritted her teeth and did her best to not look at Shepard. After a tense moment, she unclenched her fists, pointing a rigid finger at the dock worker. "You'd better be glad the Commander is here, Powell."

It was only then that she realized that McTaggart had wandered off. She glanced around to see where he's gotten off to, only to find him scanning a crate with his omni-tool.

Before she could ask him what he was doing, Powell, too, noticed what the freelancer was up to.

"Hey! Get away from that!" he shouted as McTaggart unlocked the crate and lifted the lid. He started towards the freelancer, arms waving and jaw working. He only made it a few steps before McTaggart drew his pistol and aimed it at his head. Powell stopped dead in his tracks, eyes bulging with fear, and Ashley had the sharp fear that McTaggart was going to shoot him.

The freelancer didn't pull his attention away from what he was digging for. His gun never wavered from Powell's head.

Shepard broke the tense silence. "McTaggart, what are you doing?" The Commander's tone showed that he was just as worried as Ashley was.

"Something's fishy 'bout this guy, bossman. Why would he be so protective about a bunch o' farming equipment? Unless... Aha!" He straightened up from the crate and held up a small sealed box. "Catch," he said, tossing it to Shepard without taking his gun off of Powell.

Ashley didn't know what McTaggart was getting at, but the way Powell was beginning to sweat and fidget told her that, whatever it was, the freelancer was right.

Shepard cracked open the box, and his jaw tightened. Ashley peeked over his shoulder to see three high-end weapon mods. Definitely military-grade.

Powell thought about trying to talk his way out of the mess he was in. "Look, I..." But, after the day he'd had, he just didn't have the energy. He deflated, not meeting anyone's eyes. "Yeah, I'm a smuggler. So what? What does it matter now? All of my contacts are dead! Nobody notices if a few pieces go missing from the military orders. What's the big deal?" As soon as the words were out of his mouth, he realized his mistake. He looked at each of the heavily armed Marines standing around him, eyes wide as his hands began to shake. "Look, guys, I'm s-"

Ashley was furious. Here was one of the people she and her fellow Marines risked their lives for, and he was stealing from them. She whipped out her shotgun and was a hair's breadth from blowing Powell away as she shouted: "You little weasel! We're out here trying to protect your lazy ass, and all you can do is steal from us?! I should shoot you down right where you stand!"

A hand appeared on the barrel of her gun, and Shepard said, "But you're not going to. Right, Williams?"

A few tense seconds passed while Ashley fought to get her emotions under control. Finally, she took a deep breath and gritted her teeth. "...Right, Commander," she said as she lowered her shotgun. She glared at Powell but didn't trust herself to speak.

Shepard turned back to the fidgety dock-worker, fixing him with a hard glare. "Now's the time to come clean, Powell. We're trying to save your colony; are there any other things stashed around here that could help us?"

"No. That's all I've got-"

McTaggart interrupted Powell with a snort. He tapped on his omni-tool and waved it around. The locks on seven more crates flipped from red to green with a staccato racket of latches flipping open. He fixed Powell with a smirk and said, "I'm sorry. What were ye lying?"

Powell thought about talking his way out of it. But one look at Shepard's expression - and Ashley's drawn shotgun - was enough to convince him otherwise. "Okay, fine! My smuggling days are over! Take whatever you want. Just..." he added, glancing at McTaggart's and Ashley's drawn weapons before looking pleadingly towards Shepard, "please don't kill me!"

Shepard shook his head at the thought that someone would think Alliance soldiers would do such a thing. Ashley really wanted to, but she knew better. She wasn't that kind of person, and the Alliance had trained her better than that.

"We're not going to kill you, Powell," Shepard said as he gestured for Ashley and McTaggart to put their weapons away. "But I think Chief Williams here really wants to punch you."

Ashley grinned as she advanced on the former smuggler. She liked the Commander even more, now.

"Wait, wha-?"

*whack*

*thud*

Ashley massaged her knuckles as she smirked down at Powell's unconscious form. "Thanks for that, Commander. He had more than that coming, though."

"Yes, he did," Shepard replied as he waved for the team to go through the crates. "Once we get out of here, I'll send Eden Prime's security force a message with the details. If he doesn't make it off world before things get back under control here, he'll be spending a few years in jail."

McTaggart snorted as he stepped back from the crates, crossing his arms and shaking his head. "That's mighty kind o' ye, Shepard. I still say we put a bullet in his head and save everyone the trouble."

Ashley was surprised by how quickly the Commander reacted. In two steps, he was jabbing a finger in the freelancer's face.

"That's not how we do things, McTaggart! You can tell a lot about a man by the way he treats those weaker than himself. What kind of man are you?"

McTaggart, though startled by Shepard's quick reaction, eyed the Commander levelly for a few moments. Ashley didn't know either man very well, but, if she had to bet between the freelancer's skills and the Commander's determination... she honestly didn't know who to put her money on.

After a moment, McTaggart inclined his head slightly. "Ye're right, bossman. You're absolutely right. I just wanted t' see what kind o' man I've allied meself with."

Ashley wasn't sure she believed what she was hearing, and she wasn't sure what it told her about the men in front of her.

Alenko glanced over his shoulder at the two, then looked at Ashley with a shrug. "As long as they don't shoot each other before we get out of here, right?"

A few minutes later, and the whole team had restocked their gear from Powell's stash. Alenko had found an extended barrel for his pistol, Jenkins modded his assault rifle to reduce the heat build-up, and Shepard replaced the scope on his sniper rifle with an upgraded thermal scope and modified his grenades with some high explosive material. McTaggart swapped out parts on all three of his weapons and stuffed a few extras in his belt. Meanwhile, Ashley had found an extended barrel for her assault rifle and a modified pulsar generator for her shotgun.

Just as Ashley finished snapping her rifle back together, McTaggart's omni-tool lit up with a soft beep-beep. He glanced at it then drew his rifle and snapped, "We've geth incoming, boss! That direction." He pointed to the far end of the platform, behind Alenko and Jenkins, as the team sprang into motion.

"Kaidan, get Powell behind those crates! Jenkins, fall back to me!" he ordered, waving for the Corporal to move behind him as he drew his assault rifle. "Williams, with me. Keep tight, team, and concentrate your fire. They seem to rely on their shields more than armor, so make sure your phasic apps are active."

Ashley put her rifle to her shoulder and moved up on Shepard's right flank as Jenkins took the left. She braced her rifle against her shoulder and put her eye to the sights as she waited for Shepard's order. Behind her, Alenko and McTaggart readied their omni-tools and pistols.

There was a moment of silence, and then the first geth walked around the corner of the platform. Adrenaline spiked in Ashley's chest, and her finger twitched on the trigger. But she resisted the urge and waited for Shepard's order.

"Open fire!" Shepard shouted.

Three assault rifles and two pistols poured mass accelerator rounds into the hapless synthetic. Its shields collapsed in less than two seconds, and its armor didn't last much longer.

The defunct geth fell, sparking and gushing grey fluid, to the ground.

Shepard ordered the squad forward, saying: "Kaidan, McTaggart, stay back and wide. The more you weaken their shields, the quicker we can cut through them. Williams and Jenkins, stay with me and focus on my targets unless I order otherwise."

"Aye aye, Commander," Ashley replied eagerly.

"Move out!"

Ashley stayed on Shepard's right shoulder as the team moved forward. They rounded the end of the platform as a group, surprising three more geth that were attempting to sneak up on them. The red triangle superimposed over the center Trooper in her HUD flashed as Shepard marked his target. Ashley and Jenkins joined their rifle-fire to the Commander's, cutting through its shields in an instant. The Troopers on either side jerked and stuttered as Alenko and McTaggart hit them with Overload. The freelancer's pinpoint pistol-fire felled his target. Jenkins pivoted and took down Alenko's.

"Good shooting, Jenkins," Shepard commended the young Marine. "Your injury isn't slowing you down at all?"

"No, sir," Jenkins replied. Ashley wasn't surprised. Unless she had misread him, the Corporal was a resilient kid.

Movement caught Ashley's attention. "Drones!" She targeted the two geth Drones that had just floated up over the railing from the level below. Things got hectic from there. More Drones followed, and Troopers came surging up the ramp from below. Mass-accelerator and pulse rounds filled the air, with Alenko's and McTaggart's Tech powers adding to the confusion.

When there was a lull in the geth reinforcements, Shepard ordered the team forward. Ashley moved down the ramp towards the train platform with Jenkins on her left. Shepard followed, having swapped his assault rifle for his sniper rifle. Alenko and McTaggart brought up the rear.

Ashley noticed both of the Techs scanning the defunct geth with their omni-tools. Made sense, she supposed. The geth were almost mythical, at least as far as humans were concerned. It would be nice to know a little more about them.

A shot pinged off a strut by her head, and Ashley dove behind cover. She cursed herself for losing focus. Jenkins moved to cover her, laying down a continuous stream of mass-accelerator rounds from his assault rifle. Just as he reached Ashley, he called out: "Commander!"

Bang!

"Got him, Corporal! Thanks for the assist."

Before Shepard could say anything more, a horn blared a warning. "Everybody on the train! Now! They're trying to keep us from the other platform!"

Jenkins hauled Ashley up by the arm and pushed her towards the train. It was an open affair, made of flat-bed cars to transport crates to and from the supply ships. She assumed a different train handled the liquids and such.

She ran as hard as she could, rifle clutched to her chest and legs pumping. Just as she set foot on the train, something slammed into her chest. The impact was high and to the right, spinning her around as she lost her footing. She slammed into the floor and skidded against the far side. She gasped for breath, then sighed when she felt her armor release a small amount of medi-gel into her system.

"Williams! Are you alright?" Shepard called out from the other side of the train. The geth sniper fire had pinned the men down just inside the train. All of them were bunched up and doing their best to both stay on the train and not be in the geth's line-of-sight.

"I'm fine! Just knocked down my shields and bruised me. Can you see it?"

"Uh, bossman?" It was McTaggart who spoke up first. "Do ye see the big fella down there?"

"What is that?" Jenkins asked. The young Corporal staggered as the train lurched into motion. Alenko caught the collar of his armor and hauled him back from the edge of the flatbed.

"Doesn't matter," Shepard cut in. "Williams, I took out the sniper that tagged you, but the other one is on my side of the train, behind that cover." A red triangle appeared in Ashley's HUD, marking the sniper. "Can you take it out?"

"Yes, sir," Ashley replied grimly. She dropped her assault rifle and drew her sniper rifle. She activated her Shield Boost and took a deep breath. Popping up from cover, she pressed her eye to the scope. Pulse-fire hit all around her, with a few shots pinging off her boosted shields, but she was unfazed. The setting sun threatened to blind her, but she ignored it. She saw the geth Sniper, scoping in on her. Her augmented reflexes were quicker even than the synthetic's.

Bang!

Her first shot narrowly missed the geth's rifle, hitting it on the left side of its flashlight-face. The geth's head snapped back as its shields failed.

Ashley corrected for her rifle's recoil and squeezed the trigger again.

Bang!

Her second shot went through the synthetic's neck, blowing it out and knocking its head into the air.

She was back behind cover before her target collapsed, blowing out her held breath as her overheated rifle vented. It would be a few seconds before she could fire it again.

"Damn. That was some mighty fancy shooting, Chief."

Ashley grinned despite herself at McTaggart's compliment. Maybe he's not that bad...

She stowed her sniper rifle and recovering her assault rifle, then made room as Shepard joined her behind her cover. She felt a little rush in response to the look of admiration in the Commander's bright blue eyes. Before she could say anything, Jenkins shouted from the other side of the flatbed.

"Look out! That big one's getting closer!"

Ashley peeked over cover to see what they were talking about. The Troopers were still shooting, filling the air with pulse fire. But the unit in question was a priority. It was much larger than the Troopers they had run into so far. She guessed it to be around eight feet tall. Its black armor looked proportionally thicker than its smaller brethren. The pulse cannon it was carrying was definitely bigger.

Shepard's response was immediate: "Light it up!"

McTaggart and Alenko hit the advancing behemoth with Overload as Jenkins opened fire with his assault rifle. Ashley joined her own to the assault. Shepard waited to make sure his sniper shots did the most damage.

As soon as the thing's shields dropped, Shepard shot it in the face. Much to the Commander's surprise, the round was deflected by the geth's armor. The thing responded with an electronic roar and charged them.

With surprising speed, the geth closed on the team. Shepard shouted: "Kaidan!"

Ashley heard the tell-tale thrum of biotics as the Lieutenant reacted. The geth shimmered with dark energy, then squawked as its feet left the ground. It floated over the team's heads, carried aloft by Alenko's Lift and its own forward momentum as the train sped on without it.

McTaggart chuckled as he watched the big unit float away over the empty track. "Some destroyer ye turned out t' be, boyo!" he shouted after it.

"Stay focused, McTaggart!" Shepard said, calling the freelancer back to the action. "There are still more geth between us and the beacon."

Ashley decided to switch back to her sniper rifle. With two snipers, the team made quick work of the geth manning the train. Jenkins and McTaggart laid down suppressing fire with their assault rifles, leaving Alenko to use his Tech abilities to overload shields and otherwise harry the geth Troopers. Ashley and Shepard unconsciously fell into a rhythm, one firing while the other's rifle cooled. Before she knew it, the train was clear.

She blew out a breath she didn't know she'd been holding as she holstered her rifle. Shepard did the same before clapping her on the shoulder.

"Good shooting, Williams," he told her. Turning, he addressed the rest of the team. "You good, Jenkins?"

"Yes, sir." The Corporal didn't even seem out of breath, much to Ashley's annoyance. His military upgrades must be working overtime. Poor kid's gonna crash once we get out of here.

"McTaggart, everything okay?"

"Aye, bossman. Everything's right as rain and twice as fresh."

Ashley had no idea what that meant. By the look on Shepard's face, neither did he. The freelancer was grinning easily, though, so she guessed it meant "everything was good."

Shepard waited a beat to see if McTaggart was going to explain. When he didn't, the Commander gave a small shrug and stepped over to the control console. Alenko was running the now speeding train.

"How's it looking?"

"Everything's fine, Commander. The geth didn't even try to sabotage the train." He broke off as a thought occurred to him. "Hopefully they haven't disabled the track anywhere along the line..."

Shepard laughed easily and clapped the Lieutenant's shoulder. "'Hopefully' is right. I don't think we have to worry about that; the geth have been too secretive all these years to just leave some of their troops behind for us to capture and study when this is all over."

Alenko nodded easily. "Fair enough, Shepard." He checked a display on the console before adding: "Looks like it's about a fifteen-minute ride out to the other platform."

"Good," Shepard replied with a nod. Turning to the rest of the team, he spoke up. "We've got about fifteen minutes till we reach the other platform. Check your gear and stay alert. Williams, keep your sniper rifle handy and watch for ambushes; there's no guarantee that the geth don't have a few surprises waiting for us along the way."

"Yes, sir," Ashley replied as she redrew her rifle. She was grateful for the task; it kept her from thinking too much.

McTaggart moved over closer, cradling his assault rifle and scanning the passing landscape with a practiced eye. "Ye're good, Chief," he said after a moment, surprising Ashley. "Ye've been through a lot t'day, and nothing's fazed ye so far."

Ashley snorted lightly at his comment. "Truth is, I'm freaking out."

"That's my point," McTaggart replied. "I'd be worried if ye weren't freaking out just a little. But ye've a solid head on your shoulders, Chief. That's oft-times a rarity, I've found."

It took Ashley a moment to work out what he was saying. She tried to not let the freelancer distract her from the duty Shepard had assigned her. "I...thanks, McTaggart."

He grinned easily and replied: "My friends call me Tag, remember?"

Ashley couldn't help but grin at that. "Alright, Tag." She settled back into silence as she focused on the passing landscape.

McTaggart didn't let it last very long, though. "Ye look like ye've something else on your mind, Chief."

Ashley wobbled her head for a moment but eventually responded to the freelancer. "What do the geth want? I mean, after three hundred years of self-imposed exile, why now, and why here?"

"That's a good question, Williams."

Ashley jumped a little at Shepard's voice. She noticed that McTaggart didn't even flinch. She turned to see the N7 approaching, cradling his sniper rifle.

"Do you have any ideas, Commander?" she asked him.

Shepard's expression was grim as he answered. "I can't say for sure, but I'll bet you that they're here for that beacon. It's too much of a coincidence that they show up just days after it's found. Not to mention the fact that we're here for it, too."

"Aye. Seems a might too convenient, if ye ask me," McTaggart said.

Shepard nodded, casting a glance at the other man before turning his attention back to Ashley. "I don't think it matters why the geth are here, Williams. All that matters is stopping them. The quicker we get to that beacon and secure it, the quicker we can focus on cleaning them out of this colony."

Ashley had to respect the Commander's appraisal of the situation. "I guess you're right, sir. Let's finish your mission."

"What the hell is that?"

Everyone looked to where Jenkins was pointing. Ashley's blood turned to ice. It was the same mother ship she'd seen before the attack, the one Powell had described for Shepard's team. It was rising into the air, wreathed in scarlet lightning. The very air thrummed with the obvious power of its mass effect core; it had to be massive to allow such a huge ship to land on a planet.

"My God," Alenko breathed. "If the geth have more ships like that, we're screwed."

Nobody said anything, but Ashley knew that they all agreed with the Lieutenant. They watched in awed silence until the monstrous ship had disappeared above the clouds.

The train was silent for a few minutes more as the team was each absorbed in their own thoughts. Then Alenko called from the front of the train: "Commander! We're coming into the station!"

Shepard nodded, shaking his head to clear it, and raised his voice. "Okay, team! Get ready!" Squinting at the approaching platform, he continued: "Looks like we'll exit on the right. Williams and I will cover the rest of you. Disembark and make your way up those stairs to the walkway overhead and push on to the other side. We'll follow once you're in position."

Ashley was already scanning the platform through the scope on her rifle. She saw a handful of geth milling about. But it was nothing she and her new teammates couldn't handle. "Commander, I see about five Troopers and two Rocketeers from here."

Shepard nodded as he spied the situation through his own scope. "I see them. Target the Rocket Troopers first. Wait until either we've stopped or they spot us; I don't want the team caught under fire on the train if we can help it."

As soon as the words were out of Shepard's mouth, one of the Troopers turned. It didn't point, but Ashley saw by the way it and its fellows reacted that the team had just lost the element of surprise. She sighted in and pulled the trigger, all in one motion.

Even from a moving train, her shot was perfect. The phasic envelope disrupted the Trooper's shields, allowing the round to punch through the glowing eye that seemed to be the entirety of the geth's face.

"Nice one!" McTaggart called as he and Jenkins opened fire with their assault rifles. Between their suppressing fire and Shepard's and her deadly sniper fire, they gave Alenko enough cover to get off the train.

Pulse-fire began hitting her shields, so she triggered her Shield Boost to soak up the damage and kept firing as quickly as her rifle would allow. Shepard did the same next to her.

"Commander!"

There was controlled panic in Alenko's voice. "We've got demolition charges here! The geth must have planted them!"

Shepard's reaction was instant. "Disarm them! We'll keep you covered! Jenkins, McTaggart: move up onto the walkway!"

From the corner of her eye, Ashley saw Alenko crouch down next to what she realized was a large bomb. Suppressing an unhelpful surge of adrenaline, she put her eye back to her scope and focused on keeping any geth from getting a clear shot at the Lieutenant.

Bang! Bang!

She took down another one. Then she saw mass-accelerator fire cutting across her line-of-sight, telling her that Jenkins and McTaggart were on the walkway.

"We're in position, Commander!" Jenkins called over the radio.

"Keep up your fire! Don't let any geth regain the walkway!"

"Aye, sir!"

Ashley and Shepard moved from the train. Ashley kept her rifle trained on the far side of the walkway, sniping any geth that tried to brave Jenkins' and McTaggart's suppressing fire.

McTaggart called over the radio after a moment, saying, "Hey, bossman. I don't mean t' alarm ye, but I think I see another bomb over there."

"Are you sure?"

Alenko straightened up from the now-disarmed bomb. His expression was grim as he reported, "He's right, Commander. This one was linked to two more, all here in the spaceport. We have two minutes to disarm them both."

"Great," Shepard muttered. Raising his voice again, he called out: "Jenkins and McTaggart, push to the other side of the walkway. We're right behind you. Set up a defensive perimeter around that bomb!"

"Copy!"

"Aye!"

"Come on, Kaidan. Let's get over to that other bomb," Shepard said as he swapped his sniper rifle for his Lancer. "Williams, follow us up and snipe any geth you see."

Ashley nodded, then followed as the two officers charged up the ramp. She managed to take out two more Troopers. Jenkins and McTaggart were doing a good job of suppressing the synthetic troops; not much was getting close to the bomb site.

Once at the site, Shepard ordered Alenko to disarm the bomb. As the Lieutenant settled in, he ordered Ashley, McTaggart, and Jenkins: "Move up. Slow and steady. Push the geth back, and clear a path to the third bomb." He sent the location Alenko had ferreted from the first to the team's HUDs.

"You got it, bossman," McTaggart replied for them. "Call it, Chief!"

Ashley jolted a little in surprise at the freelancer's words; she hadn't thought that he would have been so quick to follow her lead. She recovered quickly, saying: "Move up to that crate! Jenkins: suppressing fire!"

McTaggart moved without hesitation, boosting his shields and running out into fire. He moved with surprising speed, crossing the distance in a second flat. As he moved, he fired a flurry of shots from his left-handed pistol, cutting down a Trooper with his phasic ammo.

Jenkins opened up with his assault rifle, keeping the geth pinned behind cover. Ashley knew it wouldn't last, though; the geth were synthetics. They didn't care about casualties.

Sure enough, two Troopers stepped out and began advancing on the team. Before she could say anything, a Rocket Trooper stepped out between them.

"Tag! Overload the Rocket!"

"Aye aye!"

The freelancer leaned out from cover, omni-tool active, and hit the group with Overload. The Rocker Trooper took the brunt of the attack, shuddering as its shields crashed. Ashley scoped in and dropped it with a single shot to the head.

Jenkins sprayed the two Troopers with assault rifle fire. His shots pinged off their armor, McTaggart's Overload having weakened their shields. The freelancer drew his shotgun and blasted the one closest to himself, leaving Jenkins to riddle the last one.

"Move up!" Ashley shouted. She sprinted up, taking cover where McTaggart had been, while he moved up to the next crate.

"Bomb disarmed!" Alenko called over the comm. His and Shepard's fire joined the rest of the team's.

"Good work, Williams," Shepard called to Ashley. She shook off the blush that she seemed to get every time he spoke to her and focused on the work at hand.

"Secure the last bomb! McTaggart, watch your three o'clock!" The freelancer spun and shotgunned the Trooper there, then sprinted through the group that was between him and the last bomb.

Ashley lost sight of him, but heard him shout over the comm: "I've got the bomb! Could use a little help, though!"

"You heard him!" Shepard called out. "Take out those geth!"

Ashley hammered the Troopers as quickly as her Lancer would allow. Jenkins opened up with his own assault rifle, aiming high to avoid McTaggart.

Ashley wondered how the freelancer was faring. She needn't have worried. A swarm of his softball-sized drones erupted from behind the Troopers and immediately began attacking them with their little electric blasts.

Shepard and Alenko stepped up on either side of Ashley. The Lieutenant kept up a constant flurry of pistol shots while Shepard joined Ashley in sniping the Troopers. In a handful of seconds, it was all over. McTaggart was crouched over the bomb, working easily.

Ashley joined Alenko and Jenkins in forming a perimeter around the bomb. Shepard crouched next to the freelancer. "Got it?"

"Just about. This one is the control unit for the whole system."

That caught Shepard's attention. "Wait. What do you mean, 'the whole system'? There are more bombs?"

"Aye," McTaggart replied with a small nod. He tapped another sequence of commands into the holographic console before clarifying. "Looks like the wee synthetic bastards are trying to take out the whole colony. I'm seeing another fifteen bombs connected to this relay." He glanced at the Commander with a shrug. "I can only assume that they're strategically placed all over the colony, not just here in the spaceport."

Ashley couldn't keep quiet after that. Without turning her eyes from the perimeter, she said, "If this 'Saren' is really the one behind the geth, I want his damn head!"

Shepard held up a calming hand and said, "We don't know who Saren is, and we've got to catch him first. But, yeah," he added with a mirthless grin and a wink, "we're going to gut the bastard."

Ashley didn't know what surprised her more. The Commander had struck her as a by-the-book, Boy Scout kind of soldier. To hear the growl in his voice as he threatened to disembowel their enemy was surprising.

But to see him wink at her was even more surprising.

Ashley felt a rush that she hadn't felt since...well, it had been a while. She hurriedly turned back to her duty before anyone noticed her blush.

"You know what's been bothering me?" Alenko spoke up a moment later.

Shepard glanced at the Lieutenant as he stood up, joining the perimeter guard. "What's that?"

Alenko gestured vaguely with his pistol at the spaceport around them. "Where are all the workers?"

Jenkins' confused expression matched the one on Ashley's face. "What do you mean, LT?" the Corporal asked. "The geth have probably killed everyone that was working here."

"Yeah, I get that," Alenko replied with a nod. "But where are the bodies?"

Ashley felt a sick feeling form in her stomach as she glanced around. Shepard, however, was the one who voiced her fear: "Right... We haven't seen any since we got to this end..." He met Ashley's worried gaze and finished, saying: "You don't think they've turned them all into those...husks, do you?"

As if on cue, an unearthly howl rose all around them.

"Oh, ye just had to say it, didn't ye?" McTaggart asked as he got to his feet. He drew his Lancer and flexed his fingers around the grip. "Bomb's disarmed, by the way," he added conversationally.

"Good. All of them?" Shepard replied in the same tone as he glanced around for the Husks they knew were coming.

"Aye. Took down the whole system. ...I blame ye for this, Commander."

Shepard glanced at the freelancer. "Which part?"

McTaggart waved a hand vaguely. "The 'they couldn't have turned all o' the workers into Husks' part."

Alenko snorted softly. "Don't take it personally, McTaggart. This kind of thing happens to him all the time."

"Oh. Well then," McTaggart replied easily. "I take it back."

Ashley shook her head at the men's conversation. They were in the middle of an alien invasion, about to be swarmed by cybernetic zombies, and they were making jokes. She shuddered involuntarily at the thought of what the geth had done to their victims. She didn't want to believe what she had seen.

"Husks!" Jenkins called out, pointing his rifle at the group swarming from their right. Ashley aimed and opened fire, trying to ignore the fact that all of her targets had been civilians under her protection less than an hour ago.

"McTaggart!" Shepard shouted. "Hit them with your Cryo Blast; try to bottleneck them!"

"On it!"

Despite the blast of super-cooled subatomic particles freezing most of their comrades, several of the Husks made it through.

"How many workers were here?!"

Ashley shook her head at Alenko's desperate question. "To help move the beacon? Who knows?"

"Speaking of which," McTaggart chimed in. "That looks properly alien enough," he said, gesturing past the howling horde. "That be your beacon, Chief?"

Ashley squinted through her scope. "Yes! That's it! Commander, the beacon is down on that platform!"

Shepard tried to get a look at his objective, but there were too many Husks trying to claw his face off. "Kaidan!"

"I got it!" The Lieutenant shimmered with dark energy before unleashing a wave that slammed into the horde. The whole group was blown back; the ones that weren't knocked over the edge of the landing were nonetheless knocked to the ground.

"Williams! You're with me! The rest of you: back us up!" Shepard shouted as he gripped his assault rifle and charged down the ramp.

Ashley did her best to keep up. More Husks were swarming towards them, howling all the while. Just as she blew one away, she thought she recognized it as one of the men that used to deliver shipments to the military base. She suppressed the urge to vomit, focusing instead on covering Shepard's back.

"Contact right!" Alenko shouted from the rear.

"I got it!" Jenkins responded. A burst of rifle-fire told Ashley that the threat was, indeed, covered.

"Oi! Don't ye get too far ahead o' me, boyo!"

Ashley didn't have time to worry about McTaggart's shout; another pack of Husks were rushing her and Shepard. She took aim... and staggered as pulse fire slammed into her shields.

"Geth!"

"I got it!" A burst of electricity drained most of the Trooper's shields, and Ashley joined her rifle fire to Alenko's pistol. Together, they took out the Trooper in short order.

"Move!"

Ashley followed Shepard's order, sprinting to follow him up to the next intersection. She hated these enclosed spaces. Not that she was claustrophobic, but, when fighting hordes of cybernetic zombies, tight spaces with blind corners were not the best conditions.

She swapped her Lancer for her shotgun... just in time to blast a Husk as it rounded the corner, howling, right in front of her. She pulled the trigger again, decapitating the one following. The third was on her before she could fire again, so she clubbed it with the butt of her gun. The blow bounced the thing's head off the container next to it, but it recovered quickly and lunged at her again.

Bang!

The Husk's head exploded, making Ashley jump slightly.

"I got you covered, Williams," Shepard said behind her shoulder. "Move up."

The next few minutes were fast-paced and terrifying, but she and Shepard made a good team. The Commander had sent Alenko off to regroup with Jenkins and McTaggart, so it was just the two Marines, fighting back-to-back. Ashley was impressed and encouraged to see how quickly they fell into a rhythm, each covering the other's blind spots.

They found three more geth, along with an untold number of Husks, before they were done. As suddenly as the horde had attacked it was over.

For them, at least.

They could still hear gunfire and howling somewhere to their right.

"Alenko? Report!"

The Lieutenant's reply was somewhat breathless. "We've encountered heavy concentrations of Husks, plus two geth Troopers, but I think it's thinning out somewhat... Jenkins, watch your back! Shit!"

"Alenko? Kaidan!" With a glance at Ashley, Shepard gripped his shotgun and sprinted around the corner.

Ashley hurried to follow the Commander. She could still hear gunfire, and she thought it sounded a little more frantic...

"Ahhh! Get it off me!"

Ashley rounded the corner to see Jenkins spinning around in circles, trying to dislodge the Husk from his back. The thing was snarling and hissing as it battered and clawed at the Corporal's helmet. A quick glance around showed Alenko fighting off three more Husks, and a shotgun blast jerked her attention to the right where McTaggart was fighting four more of the things.

Three more jumped off a stack of containers and charged Ashley and Shepard. She winged one with a shotgun blast before Shepard put it down with a blast of his own. Two more jumped in from the left to join the charge. From the corner of her eye, she saw yet another cybernetic zombie charge into the fray, heading straight for Jenkins, who was still trying to pry the first one from his back.

That was all the attention she could spare; the Husks were on them. Shepard blasted one, ducked another's swing before clubbing it to the ground, then blasted a third in the chest before stomping on the second one's head.

For her part, Ashley managed to take out two with headshots before the next two were on her. She jumped to the side and kicked out, knocking one of them off its feet. Spinning, she dropped the barrel of her shotgun on the other one's shoulder, lined up perfectly with its head. She looked away as she pulled the trigger.

That almost cost her: the one she'd kicked away lunged at her. It batted her shotgun aside - though she thought it was more by accident than planning - and clawed at her helmet with both hands. With a grimace, she activated her omni-blade and thrust it deep into the thing's chest. It howled in response and tried to twist her head.

Ashley grunted with the effort but finally succumbed to the thing's weight, falling to the ground. Her eyes widened when the Husk's fingertips scratched her visor. Human fingernails were not that sharp. Panic welled up in her chest as she remembered that her opponent was no longer human.

The scratches were getting deeper. The Husk clawed and howled, it's body pinning Ashley's left arm between them, her omni-blade still buried in its chest. She had dropped her shotgun when the Husk knocked her down, so she was clawing at it in return, trying to find some spot that would make it hurt.

Suddenly, the thing's head hopped from its shoulders and rolled away. The body instantly went limp. Ashley looked up into Shepard's visored eyes as he stood over her. It was a second before she noticed the omni-blade jutting from his left fist. He extended his other hand and helped her up.

"You okay, Williams?"

"Yeah, I-"

An ear-piercing scream filled the air. Ashley and Shepard spun to see Jenkins on the ground. He was thrashing under the weight of two Husks, flailing wildly as the cybernetic zombies clawed and battered him. In the blink of an eye, Shepard drew his pistol and shot the nearest Husk in the head. As the corpse fell off the Corporal, it revealed the full horror of Jenkins' screams.

The visor of his helmet was shattered, and there was blood everywhere.

Shepard hesitated at the sight. Just for an instant.

Bangbang!

Before the Husk could take another swing at the young Corporal, McTaggart fired two shots, obliterating the thing's head.

Shepard recovered quickly and raced to Jenkins' side. Shoving the dead Husk off of him, he held him tightly, shouting, "It's me, Corporal! It's Shepard! I got you! I got you!" Looking up, he spotted Alenko. "Kaidan! Quick!"

The Lieutenant hurried over, sliding on his knees next to his squadmates. "Oh, God!" he said when he got a good look at the Corporal.

Shepard nodded grimly in reply. "Yeah. Just...stabilize him, Kaidan."

Jenkins was still frantic, fighting the both of them as Alenko tried to check his injuries. The Lieutenant looked up, spotted Ashley, and waved her over. "Chief, I need you to help Shepard hold him steady."

Ashley obeyed, moving over to join the two officers. She spotted McTaggart; the freelancer was watching the perimeter, though he kept glancing at the injured Corporal and frowning. She pushed the man from her mind and focused on the task at hand.

Kneeling across from Shepard, she opened her mouth to ask what she should do. Then, she saw Jenkins face. Or, more accurately, what was left of it.

The Husks had shattered the kid's visor, then pried his helmet open even more. But that wasn't the worst of it. As astonished as she'd been at what the Husks' clawed fingers could do to a hardsuit - the claw marks were still there in her own visor, marring her vision - she wasn't at all surprised to see what they could do to flesh and bone.

Jenkins' eyes were missing. Both of them. The naked bone of his eye sockets was clearly visible, as were the claw marks on them. His nose was partially torn away, too, and the Husks had raked the rest of his face, leaving it a bloody and disturbing mess.

Ashley fought to keep her gorge down and focused on helping Shepard and Alenko stabilize the unfortunate Corporal. She felt the young man relax as Alenko administered a sedative, and all three of them sighed with relief.

"I don't know what I can do for him, but I'll do my best," Kaidan said with a slow shake of his head.

"I know you will," Shepard said, patting Alenko on the shoulder. He looked up as McTaggart approached.

The freelancer was looking over Shepard's head. "That be your beacon, aye? Looks...spooky."

Ashley turned to see the beacon standing behind them, right at the edge of the loading platform. She shifted slightly as Shepard stood up next to her. This was the first time she'd seen it up close and, she had to admit, McTaggart was right.

She stepped forward, and McTaggart moved with her, stowing his pistol. She did the same with her rifle. She had to agree with McTaggart: the alien artifact did look spooky. It was glowing softly, radiating a soft green light. Some kind of energy appeared to be emanating from the base and climbing up the pillar, fading out as it reached the tapered point.

"It wasn't doing anything like that when they dug it up," she said in awe. She held up a hand as she took a step closer.

"Aye, well, there's no telling what could o' turned the damn thing on," McTaggart said, an uninterested tone in his voice. "Hey, bossman! Can I ask ye something?"

Ashley took another step closer as McTaggart turned back to join Shepard. Her curiosity was overriding her caution. She took yet another step, noting peripherally that she was stepping into the distortion field...

Suddenly, the beacon pulsed. A mass effect field grabbed her, eliciting a yelp. She struggled, but the field didn't let go. It drew her closer and closer. The beacon itself began glowing brighter and she heard an ominous hum from the thing. She felt herself getting lighter, her feet barely making contact with the ground.

Unreasoning, primal fear welled up in her chest. She had no idea what the beacon was going to do her. She didn't want to find out. At the last second, she managed to suck in a deep breath.

Before she could scream, something hit her from behind. Strong arms wrapped around her waist as she was carried forward. The extra weight overcame the mass effect field, driving her back to the ground. Her savior twisted and threw her backward. She hit the ground with a grunt and rolled clear. Another set of hands caught her, and she glanced up to see McTaggart crouching over her.

"Ye okay, Chief?"

Ashley ignored his question and looked back towards the beacon. Commander Shepard was caught in the field, now. Before she could call out to him, he doubled over, grabbing either side of his helmet with both hands. The beacon pulsed, yanking the Commander off the ground. He unfolded, throwing out his arms and legs to full extension and arching his back.

Ashley struggled to pull away from McTaggart, but he held her firmly in place, saying, "Nay! Don't touch him! It's too dangerous, Chief!"

"Shepard!"

The beacon seemed to pulse once more at her shout. Shepard shuddered and shook in the beacon's grip. The hum grew steadily louder until it was a full-blown scream; Ashley gritted her teeth against the sound, so reminiscent of that mothership's jamming signal.

Just when she thought it couldn't get any worse, the beacon gave a final pulse and exploded.

Ashley and McTaggart both threw up arms to protect themselves. When the flash faded, she saw Shepard lying flat on his back. Scrambling to her feet, she hurried over. It wasn't until she reached the Commander that she realized that McTaggart was right behind her.

"Shepard? Shepard!" She wouldn't let her mind go there, but part of her feared the worst. She looked at McTaggart, who was scanning the Commander with his omni-tool. "Is he...?"

McTaggart shook his head. "He's fine. Unconscious, but fine." He glanced at the still-smoking debris of the beacon and shrugged. "Though there's no telling what that thing did to him."

The guilt took a firmer grip on Ashley's chest at McTaggart's words. If it hadn't been for her stupidity, Shepard wouldn't be in the state he was in, now.

Spinning around, she found Alenko. The Lieutenant was still crouched over Jenkins, but the look on his face said that he was just as concerned about Shepard. "How is he?"

McTaggart answered before Ashley could. "He's stable, but, with that thing, who knows?"

"Have you contacted your ship?" Ashley demanded.

Alenko nodded. "Shepard already called in the beacon and Jenkins' injury. They're on their way."

Ashley replied with a nod. She felt even more guilty for snapping at the Lieutenant. After all, his entire team was down and injured, and at least one of them was her fault. She shut her eyes tightly, then shook her head.

A hand on her shoulder brought her out of her daze. Looking up, she saw that McTaggart had retracted his breather. His visor was transparent, too. He favored her with an understanding expression. "Trust me, Chief: this was nay your fault. In fact," he added with a mysteriously mirthful twinkle in his brown eyes, "I'll wager things are gonna turn out pretty damn fine because o' what just happened here."

Ashley just stared at him, shaking her head uncomprehendingly. McTaggart gave her another reassuring pat on the shoulder and turned away without another word, moving over to inspect the wreckage of the beacon.

What the hell was that supposed to mean?

Ashley and McTaggart carried Shepard's unconscious form over to where Alenko was still working on Jenkins. Ashley stood to the side as Alenko kept an eye on Jenkins and McTaggart kept one on Shepard. The two men had better training in first aid than she did. She took it upon herself to keep an eye on the perimeter, in case there were anymore geth or Husks wandering about. No enemies made an appearance, and the Normandy arrived, skirting around the side of the spaceport.

The pilot deftly swung the sleek ship around and slid the nose over the platform. The Cargo Bay door began lowering as it got closer. Ashley held up a hand to shield her face from the breeze that the ship kicked up. The ramp lowered in front of her and Ashley saw an older black man in a Captain's uniform. On either side of him were two Marines in duty uniforms. Each of them carried an assault rifle and surveyed the area before following the Captain down the ramp.

"What's the situation, Lieutenant?" The Captain had a deep voice with a soft London accent that was tempered by years of service in the diverse Alliance Navy. Ashley thought his voice sounded fatherly.

Alenko looked up at the Captain's approach. He didn't rise, and the Captain waved for him to stay where he was. "Captain. We've secured the spaceport, but Jenkins was wounded. We found the beacon," he said, gesturing with a blood-covered hand at the wreckage, "but it self-destructed when Shepard got too close."

The Captain nodded, taking the report in stride. "And what's the Commander's status?"

Alenko gestured to where McTaggart was still scanning Shepard. "He's stable, but you'd need to ask McTaggart here for more than that."

"Mr. McTaggart, I'm Captain Anderson," the Captain said as he crouched down across the Commander from the freelancer. "What can you tell me about Shepard's status?"

McTaggart shrugged slightly. "Not much more than what Alenko told ye. He's stable. All vitals are normal. No signs of trauma beyond what I assume he got fighting today. But he's unconscious; no signs as to why. I can only assume that beacon put the whammy on him, somehow."

Anderson gave the man a measured look before glancing back at the wreckage of the beacon. "I see. I'll have my ship's Doctor take a look at him if it's all the same to you."

"Oh, o' course! A man's got t' take care of his crew, Captain," McTaggart replied with an easy grin. "And here she must come!" he said as he straightened from his crouch.

Ashley turned to see a middle-aged woman with silvery grey hair hurrying down the ramp. She went straight to Commander Shepard. McTaggart stepped out of her way, rattling off a far more detailed report than the one he'd given Captain Anderson. The Doctor nodded, acknowledging his diagnosis even as she examined the Commander herself.

After a moment she looked up at Anderson. "He's going to be fine, Captain. Please have him carried into the Med Bay. Now, where is Jenkins?"

"Right here, Doctor," Alenko spoke up, getting her attention. She hurried over. When she saw Jenkins' ruined face for the first time, Ashley thought she saw the older woman recoil slightly. Her professionalism took over, then, and she dropped to her knees next to the Corporal. Alenko gave her his report even as she ran her omni-tool over the young man.

Ashley found herself standing next to McTaggart, the two of them standing a pace behind Captain Anderson. She was startled when McTaggart spoke up. "I know this may nay be the proper time, Captain, but I was a-wondering if ye had an opening or two on your very fine boat."

Ashley blanched at the freelancer's coarse request. Anderson turned his head and gave the man another slow, measured look. Before he could say anything, Alenko stepped over to them.

"Captain, I'd like to introduce you to Gunnery Chief Ashley Williams of the Two-Twelve and John McTaggart. We picked them up in the course of our mission, and they proved to be invaluable."

Anderson nodded and turned to Ashley. "The Two-Twelve, you say? Where's the rest of your squad, Gunnery Chief?"

Ashley dipped her head briefly before replying. "They...we walked into a geth ambush. I'm the only one who survived, sir."

Anderson blinked as if Ashley had tweaked his nose. "I'm sorry for your loss, Williams, but did you say geth?"

"Yes, sir."

Anderson looked back at Alenko. "Is that accurate, Lieutenant? Eden Prime was attacked by the geth?"

"Yes, sir. But I think there's more to it than that," Alenko replied with a small nod. "We had several eyewitnesses who claimed that there was a turian leading the geth."

"A turian? I assume he was the same one that Shepard reported killed Nihlus? Is that all we know?"

"No, sir. One of the colonists was present when Nihlus was murdered. He said that Nihlus knew him and called him 'Saren.'"

"Saren?"

"Y...yes, sir," Alenko replied carefully. Anderson's startled reaction was surprising. "Do you know that name, sir?"

Anderson cast his gaze around at the destruction that marred the usually beautiful Eden Prime panorama. After a moment, he nodded. "That I do, son. As soon as Doctor Chakwas declares Jenkins ready to move, get everyone onboard." He gestured in Ashley and McTaggart's direction. "I want you two to join us, as well. Have the Quartermaster get your gear squared away then come to my cabin. I'll want to debrief the both of you personally."

Ashley snapped off a textbook salute. "Yes, sir!"

McTaggart's salute was considerably sloppier and unenthusiastic. "You bet, Captain."

Anderson shook his head at McTaggart's unprofessionalism and turned to head back up the ramp. "Alenko, I'll want your report ASAP."

"Yes, sir!"

An hour later, Ashley was in the Mess, grabbing a bite to eat. She hadn't noticed during the mission, but lunch had been a long time ago. Plus, she had burned a lot of calories over the last several hours.

The debrief with Anderson had gone about as expected. The Captain wanted to know what had gone on with his crew, why he had an injured Corporal and an unconscious Commander, and why he was on his way to the Citadel to report that one of their Spectres had been shot in the back on his mission. Ashley gave him all the answers she had, which wasn't much. Afterward, Anderson informed her that he was putting in a request to have her transferred to the Normandy. She was grateful, but she tried to keep most of it from her face as she saluted.

Mctaggart's report wasn't quite as succinct, but it was essentially the same information. He did volunteer the scans he'd taken with his omni-tool, and Anderson was grateful for them. When the Captain had dismissed them, though, the freelancer had acknowledged that Anderson's time was precious but asked if he could have a few minutes alone with him. Anderson considered the request but apparently realized that it would be less of a headache to concede to it now rather than have the man constantly bugging him. So, Ashley had been dismissed to find some food and get cleaned up.

Alenko joined her. He looked as tired and battered as she felt, but he was just as hungry as she was, too. He gave her a ghost of a smile as he snagged a mug and filled it with coffee. "Perkins is on duty; he always makes it strong. Today, I'm thankful for that."

Ashley smiled back and raised her own mug in salute. "So am I." She turned around and leaned back against the counter. After a moment, she asked: "How's the Commander?"

Alenko nodded as he dug for a protein bar. "He's okay. McTaggart's diagnosis was spot on; there's no trauma or anything, so Doctor Chakwas can't figure out why he won't wake up. She did say something about 'abnormal beta waves,' though, so something must have affected him."

Ashley nodded carefully. She didn't know what else to say. After a long moment, she had to ask: "And how's Jenkins?"

Alenko grimaced as he shrugged. "That's a harder question to answer. Doctor Chakwas says she's doing all she can for him, but there was a lot of damage. And not just to his soft tissue, either. The Husks carved up a good portion of his skull, too."

Ashley grimaced in sympathy. She had been trying very hard to forget the sight of poor Jenkins' torn up face. "Did the Doctor say what his chances were?"

"Oh, he's going to survive," Alenko said apologetically. "I didn't mean to imply that he wasn't going to… Anyway. Yes, he'll be okay. It's just that, the sooner we get him to the Citadel and the medical facilities there, the more they'll be able to do to reconstruct his face."

"That's good," Ashley replied with obvious relief. "I...I can't imagine what that must have been like."

"Yeah…" Alenko shook his head in sympathy. "Neither can I." He let another minute slide by in silence before something occurred to him. "Hey, where is McTaggart?"

Ashley glanced towards the CO's cabin. "I guess he's still in with Captain Anderson. He asked to talk to the Captain in private after our debriefing." She frowned as she added: "But that was twenty minutes ago. I wonder what…"

She trailed off as two Marines in full armor, cradling assault rifles, hurried by. She and Alenko set their mugs down and followed at a discreet distance as they headed towards the CO's cabin. Ashley and Alenko glanced at each other, but neither had a chance to speak before the door slid open again.

The Marines escorted a handcuffed McTaggart out of Anderson's cabin. The Captain followed, ordering: "Keep him in the Cargo Bay, under guard, until I order otherwise. And make sure he gets something to eat."

Ashley opened her mouth to ask the freelancer what was going on as he passed by, but he just shook his head with that infuriating grin and gave her a wink. Before she could figure out what that meant, he was gone. She looked back to Anderson, but the Captain merely ordered them to be as they were before turning and disappearing back into his cabin.

Alenko looked just as confused as Ashley. "What was that all about?"

"You got me, LT," Ashley replied with a shrug. "I barely know the guy."

"It seems like he managed to piss off Captain Anderson, though. And he did it in twenty minutes, too," Alenko said. "I think only Joker's managed to do that so far. "

"Well," Ashley said with a grin, "after twenty minutes, I'm surprised the Captain didn't shoot him."

Fifteen hours later, Ashley was in the Med Bay, sitting on a stool. Since she hadn't been assigned any duties on the Normandy yet, she was chatting with Doctor Karin Chakwas.

She was hesitant to admit it - even to herself - but she was also there to watch over Shepard. No matter how much she told herself it wasn't her fault, she couldn't get rid of the guilt; if she hadn't been so stupid, Shepard wouldn't have had to save her, and he wouldn't have been caught by the beacon.

Doctor Chakwas had tried to get Ashley to go rest, but she refused. Instead, the two women chatted while Karin did her paperwork. Occasionally, Karin checked the vitals on her patients; Shepard was fine, and Jenkins had been heavily sedated to keep him unconscious. The young man's head was wrapped in several layers of gauze bandages. Even from across the room, Ashley could see the blood soaking through.

Doctor Chakwas was changing Jenkins' bandages when a soft sound caught Ashley's attention. She glanced around for a moment before hearing it again. It was coming from Shepard. She leaped from her chair and leaned over the Commander's bed, listening intently. Seeing him stir, she realized he was groaning softly. His eyelids fluttered, and Ashley glanced over her shoulder at Karin.

"Doctor Chakwas! It's Shepard! I think he's waking up."

Karin finished up with Jenkins before hurrying over. By the time she arrived, Shepard's eyes were open. It took him a moment to focus, but, when he did, he saw the two women staring down at him. He groaned again as he shifted and started to sit up. Karin moved towards him, but he waved her off. He swung his legs over the side of the bed and sat up. The effort made him groan again, and he leaned forward, cradling his head in his hands.

Karin gave him a moment before asking: "You had us worried there, Shepard. How are you feeling?"

Shepard slowly shook his head, then looked up at her. "Like the morning after shore leave," he groaned. "How long was I out?"

Karin checked the time. "About fifteen hours. Something happened down there with the beacon, I think."

Ashley spoke up at that, looking a little guilty. "It's my fault. I must have triggered some kind of security field when I approached it. You had to push me out of the way."

Shepard, his head still in his hands, tilted slightly to give Ashley a tired smile. "Don't blame yourself. You had no way to know what would happen."

Ashley smiled slightly and replied with a single, grateful nod.

Karin, with a slight grin, spoke up: "Actually, we don't even know if that's what set it off. Unfortunately, we'll never get the chance to find out."

Shepard looked up at that. "Why? Where's the beacon now? What happened to it?"

The Commander's accepting attitude made it a little easier for Ashley to speak up. "It exploded. A system overload, maybe. The blast knocked you cold. Alenko had already called in the Normandy for Jenkins, so it arrived a few minutes later."

Shepard nodded. "Good. What's the damage, Doc?"

Karin glanced at the readout above the Commander's head before waving her hand. "Physically, you're fine. But I detected some unusual brain activity. Abnormal beta waves. I also noticed an increase in your rapid eye movement, signs typically associated with intense dreaming."

Shepard shook his head, struggling to make sense of the images in his head. "More like a nightmare. I saw… I'm not sure what I saw. Death. Destruction. Nothing's really clear."

"Hmm…" Karin frowned, tapping her chin. "I better add this to my report. It may-" The door on the far side of the room slid open, revealing the Captain. "Oh. Captain Anderson."

Ashley snapped to attention and saluted. Anderson nodded for her to stand at ease as he made his way across the Med Bay. "How's our XO holding up, Doctor?"

"All the readings look normal," Karin replied. "I'd say the Commander's going to be fine."

Anderson nodded, as though he hadn't expected to hear anything else. "Glad to hear it. Shepard," he continued, his tone turning official, "I need to speak with you… in private."

Ashley took that as her cue. Snapping off another salute, she said: "Aye aye, Captain. I'll be in the Mess if you need me." She turned and made her way out of the Med Bay without a second look. Karin only followed her halfway, stopping at her desk.

The door slid closed behind Ashley, leaving Captain Anderson and Commander Shepard alone at the back of the Med Bay. Anderson took a moment to size up Shepard. "Sounds like that beacon hit you pretty hard, Commander. You sure you're okay?"

Shepard pushed himself off of the bed and leaned back against the wall. Crossing his arms, he shrugged. "I'll live." His demeanor showed that something was on his mind, though. After a moment, he shook his head to clear it. Gesturing towards the outer door of the Med Bay, he remarked: "Chief Williams isn't part of the Normandy crew."

Anderson replied with a slight shrug and a small grin. "I figured we could use a soldier like her. She's been reassigned to the Normandy. "

Shepard nodded agreeably. "She's a good soldier. She deserves it."

"Lieutenant Alenko agrees with you. That's why I added her to our crew."

The Commander was silent for another long moment. Anderson wasn't sure what was going through his head; whether it was the aftermath of the beacon's explosion or Chief Williams' assignment to the Normandy. He didn't rush the other man, though, letting him work things out on his own.

Meanwhile, the Captain pondered over the conversation he had had with John McTaggart fifteen hours ago. He didn't know nearly enough about the man, and what little he had gleaned from their short conversation made him distinctly uneasy. What he'd overheard Shepard saying to the Doctor as he'd stepped into the Med Bay meshed with the freelancer's story in an unsettling way. He didn't want to think of the ramifications if McTaggart turned out to be right.

Instead, he looked the Commander over, taking his own measure of Shepard's condition to compare with the Doctor's report. Except for a few scrapes and bruises, and the haggard look that said his sleep over the last fifteen hours had not been restful, he looked good. Ready to get on with the next mission. Anderson nodded to himself; that was exactly the man he knew. Shepard had never been one to sit and mull over things for long.

Sure enough, when the Commander raised his head a moment later, there was a fire in his eyes. "Intel dropped the ball, sir! Geth? We had no idea what we were walking into down there. That's why things went to hell!"

Anderson held up a conciliatory hand. "The geth haven't been outside the Veil in two centuries, Commander. Nobody could have predicted this."

"Maybe you're right," Shepard replied begrudgingly. Shaking his head, he added: "I may be trained for missions where I have no idea what's going on, but I don't like taking green soldiers into those situations."

Anderson immediately shook his head. "Jenkins didn't die, Shepard. Alenko stabilized him, and Doctor Chakwas has done her best," he said, gesturing at the bed the Corporal was lying on. He watched Shepard as the Commander absorbed the sight. "What happened to Jenkins wasn't your fault; soldiers get wounded. That's part of the job description. You did a good job down there, Shepard."

Shepard was silent for a moment. He stared at Jenkins' still form, watching intently to see the young man's chest rise and fall. Only once he was sure of what he was seeing did he look away. He rubbed the bridge of his nose, then shook his head. "You said you wanted to talk to me?"

"I won't lie to you, Shepard," Anderson replied, crossing his arms. "Things look bad. Nihlus is dead. The beacon was destroyed and the geth are invading. The Council's going to want answers."

"I didn't do anything wrong, Captain," Shepard stated. "Hopefully, the Council can see that."

"I'll stand behind you and your report," Anderson replied. "You're a damned hero in my book. That's not why I'm here." He took a brief moment to catch his breath. "It's Saren, that other turian. He's a Spectre, one of the best. A living legend. But if he's working with the geth, it means he's gone rogue. A rogue Spectre's trouble. Saren's dangerous. And he hates humans."

That surprised Shepard a little. "Why?"

"He thinks we're growing too fast," Anderson replied. Then, he shrugged. "A lot of aliens think that way. Most of them don't do anything about it."

Shepard was already shaking his head. "Saren didn't go to Eden Prime because he hates humans."

"You're right." Anderson shook his head as he worked it all out. His earlier conversation with McTaggart was haunting him. He didn't want to say anything to Shepard about it, though. Not least because the only time McTaggart had seemed truly desperate during their conversation was when he urged Anderson to keep the contents of their conversation from the Commander. It wasn't that he was inclined to do the freelancer any favors. But, if what he had hinted at was true, then the man locked up in the Cargo Bay was a lot more dangerous than the ground team's reports made him out to be.

Anderson shook his head again and turned his attention back to the conversation at hand. "Saren has allied himself with the geth. I don't know how. I don't know why. But it has something to do with that beacon. You were there just before it self-destructed. Did you see anything? Any clue that might tell us what Saren was after?"

Shepard shook his head and closed his eyes. "Just before I lost consciousness, I had some kind of… of vision."

"A vision?" McTaggart's words were ringing in Anderson's ear. "A vision of what?"

Shepard frowned as he replayed the memory in his head. "I saw… synthetics. Geth, maybe," he added with a shrug. "Slaughtering people… butchering them." He shivered slightly as the vision washed over him again, and he shook his head to clear it as he opened his eyes.

Anderson felt as shaken as Shepard looked. Shepard's words, coupled with McTaggart's fifteen hours earlier, struck a chord deep in the Captain's chest. As much as he wanted to believe that it was all the result of the trauma of Shepard's accident, he knew it was more than that. "We need to report this to the Council, Shepard."

Shepard replied with a snort as he straightened up from where he'd been leaning against the wall. "What are we gonna tell them? That I had a bad dream?"

Anderson held up a hand. "We don't know what information was stored in that beacon. Lost Prothean technology? Blueprints for some ancient weapon of mass destruction? Whatever it was, Saren took it; he got to that beacon before you did." He fixed the Commander with a determined expression, his fist clenched firmly at his side. "But I know Saren. I know his reputation, his politics. He believes humans are a blight on the Galaxy. This was an act of war!" he exclaimed, slamming his clenched fist into his other palm. "He has the secrets from the beacon. He has an army of geth at his command. And he won't stop until he's wiped humanity from the face of the galaxy!"

Shepard didn't know his Captain's history with Saren. But he definitely agreed with him. He nodded firmly, clenching his own fist and saying, "I'll find some way to take him down."

"It's not that easy," Anderson replied, shaking his head. "He's a Spectre. He can go anywhere, do almost anything. That's why we need the Council on our side. "

Shepard nodded, catching onto the Captain's plan. "We prove Saren's gone rogue, and the Council will revoke his Spectre status."

Anderson replied with a nod of his own. "If we prove Saren's a traitor, they'll have no choice but to revoke his Spectre status!" Now that he had a plan, Anderson felt a little more in control of things. "I'll contact the Ambassador and see if he can get us an audience with the Council. He'll want to see us as soon as we reach the Citadel." He turned and headed towards the exit, waving Shepard to follow. "We should be getting close. Head up to the bridge and tell Joker to bring us into dock."

Ashley was waiting in the Mess when the Captain and Shepard excited the Med Bay. She snapped to attention, saluting as they approached. Both men returned her salute, but only Shepard really looked at her. Anderson peeled off and headed for the lift. Shepard saw where he was headed and asked: "Something wrong, Captain? I thought you were going to contact the Ambassador."

Anderson nodded as he waited for the lift to arrive. "I am. I need to deal with our prisoner first." Before Shepard could ask what he meant, the Captain stepped into the lift and disappeared.

Shepard turned back to Ashley, and she almost laughed at the confusion on his face. "Where did we pick up a prisoner, Chief?"

"It's McTaggart," Ashley replied with a wry grin. "I don't know what he said to the Captain, but he asked to speak with Anderson in private after our debrief. When they were done, Anderson had him put under guard and confined to the Cargo Bay."

Shepard blinked at that. "Do you have any idea what they were talking about?"

"No, McTaggart didn't say anything to me about it." She thought back to when they were hauling the freelancer off. "He didn't seem too worried about it, though."

"Well, I hope the Captain drops whatever he charged him with. He was very helpful down on Eden Prime."

Ashley nodded thoughtfully. The moment stretched just slightly until it was starting to feel awkward. She cleared her throat and said: "I'm glad you're okay, Commander. The, uh, the crew could use some good news after what happened to Jenkins."

"Jenkins isn't dead, Chief," Shepard replied, mirroring Anderson's reply to Shepard's own concern. "Sure, he took a beating. But things turned out alright. Doctor Chakwas patched him up as best she could, and we're taking him to the Citadel for more in-depth treatment. There's cloning and cybernetics; lots of options. He'll be fine."

"I know. But… getting shot is one thing. Getting mauled by cybernetic zombies? That's something else entirely."

Shepard nodded sympathetically. "Yeah. That's… definitely not anything like what I expected to find down there." He let another moment of silence pass between them before asking: "Things were a little rough down there. How are you holding up?"

"I've seen friends die before. Comes with being a marine. But to see my whole unit wiped out…" Ashley replied with a frown as she shook her head. "And you never get used to seeing dead civilians. But things would have been a lot worse if you hadn't shown up," she finished, looking up at Shepard.

It was Shepard's turn to frown. "Dead Marines. Dead colonists. And in the end, we still didn't get that beacon."

"You saved a lot of lives, Commander." Including mine, she thought. "It might be hard to keep that in perspective with what happened to you and Jenkins."

"Thanks, Williams. I needed to hear that," Shepard replied with a slight smile. "And we couldn't have done it without you, either. I think you're gonna fit in just fine here."

Ashley smiled back and had to fight a strong urge to blush. "Thanks, Commander. I have to admit, I was a little worried about being assigned to the Normandy. It's nice when someone makes you feel welcome."

"I, uh…" Shepard hesitated, and Ashley got the feeling that that was an unusual thing for him. "I should go. I'll talk to you later."

"Yeah. I'll talk to you later, uh… too." As Shepard walked past her and headed over to where Alenko was standing, she felt that blush working its way up her face. You're such an idiot! she shouted at herself as she darted back into the Med Bay.

As soon as she did, Karin looked up from her desk. Ashley felt her blush deepen as she realized that the woman could see right through her. Karin smiled knowingly and waved her over, saying: "Looks like somebody has a crush…"

It was too late to back out of the Med Bay, and Ashley steeled herself for the awkward conversation to follow.

The Cargo Bay of the SSV Normandy was dark and cramped. The ship's Mako took up nearly the entire starboard side, with the Quartermaster's area sandwiched between the tank and the rear bulkhead. I was sprawled on the floor on the port side, with my back against the wall. The rear bulkhead was to my right, and the Marines' lockers to my left. My own weapons and armor were stored in one; one of the Marines had put a security lock on it after my conversation with Captain Anderson, and I had to suppress a grin at how easy it would have been to hack it.

Two Marines stood watch over me, but I had put them at ease several hours ago. Actually, these two were the second shift: Mattingly and Hornigold. They were as easygoing as I could expect them to be, but neither of them were conversationalists. That suited me just fine.

The Armor had been casually scanning the Normandy over the last fifteen hours. After studying the scans I'd taken of the Husks on Eden Prime, I busied myself perusing the ship's specs via my Retinal Displays; I figured that was the more prudent thing to do, rather than using the display on my omni-tool and having to explain to Mattingly and Hornigold how I had gotten hold of their top-secret ship's schematics. To them, it simply appeared as though I was taking a nap, propped up against the bulkhead.

I had already come up with a few ways to improve the ship's systems. Most of them would be implemented without my help in the next few years, but I decided to keep a few of the more exotic ideas on file for later.

The Armor nudged me, so I checked the chrono without opening my eyes. If I was right, I should be getting a visitor right about…

The lift door slid open, and Captain Anderson marched out. He looked angry, but also resigned. I took that as a good sign.

I got to my feet as Mattingly and Hornigold saluted their Captain. "At ease, men," Anderson told them after returning their salute. "You're dismissed. The prisoner is free to go."

"Yes, sir," they replied, snapping off another set of salutes.

I did my best to keep the grin off my face as I flipped Anderson a two-fingered salute. "Shepard's awake."

It wasn't a question, but Anderson replied anyway. "Yes. He is. I would wonder how you know that," he said, "but I'm more curious to know how you knew what he was going to say when he woke up."

"I already told ye, Captain: it's not important how I knew that," I replied with a shrug. "What is important is that I was right. Now, if you're willing to hear it, I've got more to tell ye."

Anderson eyed me critically for a few moments. "What am I thinking right now?" he finally asked.

I grinned and replied instantly: "Ye can't decide whether t' trust me or t'row me out the airlock." I cocked my head and added: "And you're considering punching me in the face for good measure."

Anderson grimaced. Then, without another word, he turned and headed back to the lift, waving for me to follow. As we ascended, he stared straight ahead. Without turning, he said, "I still haven't completely decided against throwing you out the airlock."

"I know."


	2. And So It Begins (Virmire 1)

The SSV Normandy slid silently through the cold expanse of space. With its stealth systems engaged, it was invisible in nearly every spectrum. The only way to notice it was to actually see it with the naked eye; an impossible task in the infinity of space.

I was sitting in the mess, chatting over a cup of coffee with a couple of the crew. Staff Lieutenant Kaidan Alenko had just joined us. We were discussing the benefits of caffeine as they related to biotics.

"I'm definitely a believer," Alenko said. He held up his own mug as proof and in salute, then downed it.

I laughed along with everyone else. "But," I wanted to know, "What happens when ye've had too much? Ye know. When ye get... twitchy."

Alenko shrugged. "Well, it's usually best if I don't get to that point."

Garrus Vakarian walked up at that point. "Now, that's something I think I'd actually like to see," he remarked.

After a moment considering the turian's comment, I shook my head and said: "I'm pretty sure that would be a bad idea. Right, Alenko?"

"Yeah, that would be bad," the Lieutenant replied.

As Garrus got his own drink and took a seat, the conversation moved on to other things. I finished the rest of my mug and got up to get a refill. Relatively alone, I checked the time on my omni-tool. I opened an encrypted file in my Retinal Display and checked the time against the list of events in the file. Heading back to the group with my refilled mug, I was doing some figuring in my head. If I was right, it should be anytime now…

On cue, Joker's voice came over the comm. " _We're on course for Virmire. The Commander would like all Specialists to assemble in the comm room."_

With a shrug, I downed my drink all in one go, then put the empty mug in the sterilizer. I waved at the crew that was still sitting around the table and followed Alenko and Vakarian around the lift shaft. Glancing back as I heard a door hiss open, I saw Liara T'Soni exiting the Med Bay. I stopped and gave her a small smile and a 'Come on' wave. She caught up to me and said, "Thank you," with a shy smile. Together, we headed up the curving stairs after the Lieutenant and Vakarian to the Command Deck.

We walked around to the rear of the deck, tossing a casual salute towards XO Presley, and entered the Comm Room. I stopped in my usual place at the bottom of the slight ramp that led down into the Comm Room proper. Liara took her seat in the ring of chairs next to Vakarian.

Liara hadn't even got settled into her chair when the door slid open again, revealing Gunnery Chief Ashley Williams and Urdnot Wrex. Ash looked all business as she walked past me with a nod and took her seat next to Alenko. Wrex looked amused/grumpy/hungry, as usual. He walked past me with a grunt (his version of a polite nod) and sat next to Liara.

Now, we were just waiting for two more. Even as I had the thought, the door hissed open again and in they came. Tali'Zorah nar Rayya came down the ramp with only the slightest hesitation. I was sure that the young quarian was grateful for her environmental suit; it kept us from seeing how uncomfortable she was with us all watching her. As she passed me, she paused for just a fraction of a second before bumping my outstretched fist with her own. I sensed, more than saw, her slight grin as she took her seat between my spot and where Ash was seated. My C.A.S.I.E. implants were getting better at reading the aliens on the crew. I hadn't had much interaction with any of their species before joining Shepard's team, and it was taking some time to calibrate to their unique "tells." I knew Tali pretty well, though.

Following a couple of steps behind Tali was the Survivor of Akuze, the man who would become the Hero of the Citadel, the man who would take down the Collectors, and the man who would become the savior of the whole freaking galaxy… as long as I didn't screw up what I was here for.

Lieutenant Commander John Shepard, Captain of the SSV Normandy, and the first human Spectre. It was his actions that got Saren Arterius thrown out of the Spectres, and it was his mission that we were all now on. We'd already found and recruited the asari archeologist, Doctor T'Soni. Liara was a good kid, despite her Mother being Saren's top lieutenant. And I'm using the term 'kid' loosely, of course, considering that she's one hundred and six years old. But that is young for her species.

After recruiting her, we went to Feros, an ancient and overgrown world-city. There, we had found Saren's geth attacking the human colonists. We stopped them and found out _why:_ the colonists were protecting an ancient sentient plant creature called the Thorian. The thing had given Saren something called 'the Cipher,' the combined knowledge and life experience of the entire Prothean race, and his geth were trying to kill it before Shepard could get the Cipher. We managed to fend off the geth, save the colonists, and get Shepard the Cipher.

He said that it helped him make a little more sense out of the vision that the beacon on Eden Prime. But he still didn't understand all that it was trying to show him.

Now, we were about to start the most critical battle of our mission. At least, as far as I was concerned.

Shepard walked past me with a nod and took up his usual spot in front of the Comm terminal, directly across the ring of seated Specialists from where I was standing.

"Okay, people. I talked to the Council, and they've given us a possible lead on Saren. It seems that a salarian Special Task Group was on a reconnaissance mission to Virmire, investigating Saren's activities."

Alenko sat forward in his chair and asked: "I take it that they found something since we're being called in?"

Shepard shrugged. "That's just it: we don't know. They've gone silent."

We all looked at each other, wondering what Saren was up to now. I knew, of course, but I wasn't about to let them know that.

After giving us a moment to digest the news, Shepard continued. "The Council received a message on a secure channel that was meant only for mission-critical transmissions. But the message wasn't much more than static. So, we don't know what the salarians found, and we don't know how many are still alive."

"We also don't e'en know if Virmire has anything t' do with Saren," I added. I figured it wouldn't hurt. After all, we were going to find out soon enough, anyway.

Ash turned back to Shepard and said: "He has a point, Commander. Do we know if Saren even went to Virmire?"

"No," Shepard replied after giving me a hard look. "We don't. But the Council thought Virmire important enough to send the STG there, so I think it's worth checking out."

Wrex spoke up then, and I could feel his deep bass voice rumble in my chest. "What about Noveria? We still haven't investigated the reports of geth activity out there, yet."

I glanced at Shepard and shrugged. "Aye, but if Virmire really _is_ connected t' Saren, I doubt we have the time t' check out Noveria first. I mean, ye said the static came in on a mission-critical channel, right, Shepard?"

The Commander nodded. "Exactly. The Normandy is already en route. We'll be there in an hour. Everybody, check your gear. I'll pick the team when we get there. Dismissed."

As everybody got up to leave, I caught a quick but telling glance between Shepard and Williams and suppressed a grin. It was funny that the whole rest of the crew knew that something was going on between the two, but that they hadn't figured it out yet. Honestly, that seemed to be a universal constant.

I turned to follow everybody out, but Shepard called me back. I waited until the rest had filed out, promising to help Tali run diagnostics on her suit. Then I turned and headed back into the ring.

Shepard waited until the door hissed closed before addressing me. "Alright, McTaggart. What do you know about Virmire?"

I shrugged, keeping my knowledge off my face. "Nothing, really. It's a colony world. Or, it would be, if it weren't so close t' the Terminus Systems. Those pirates-"

Shepard shook his head sharply and chopped his hand. "Cut the crap, Tag! What do you _know_ about Virmire?"

I gave him a hard look, showing that I didn't appreciate his tone. But then I softened my expression and shook my head, replying: "I don't know much, Shepard. Truly."

He glanced away, considering. Then he looked back at me and asked: "Do you have a bad feeling about this one?"

I thought for a moment. I had to consider my response carefully. Finally, I shrugged and shook my head slowly. "Not a bad feeling, exactly. Just a… big feeling. Like, this mission is going t' be… critical. Or, important. Momentous, maybe? I don't know, Shepard. I'm sorry, but that's all I've got."

Shepard was quiet for a moment as he considered what I'd told him. "Okay. But you'll let me know if you come up with anything else?"

"O' course," I lied. There was no way that I was going to tell him what was coming. I couldn't take the chance that it would influence his decisions. No matter what happened, Shepard's decisions had to be his own; it was up to me to make sure this mission ended happily.

When Shepard didn't say anything else, I finally gestured towards the door with my thumb. "Can I go? I want t' talk t' Joker before I help Tali with her suit."

He nodded and followed as I headed up the ramp. "I need to go see Doctor Chakwas, anyway."

I couldn't resist, so I said with a grin, "And I think Ash wanted t' see ye, too."

Shepard gave me a mixed look as he tried to figure out what I meant. But, by then, we were out on the main deck. I gave him a casual salute and said, "Later, Commander," as I headed towards the cockpit.

I won't say for certain if I saw the slightest of blushes starting on his face. He ducked his head and headed for the stairs without another word before I could call him on it.

I passed the Galaxy Map, nodding greetings to a few of the crew as I went, and went up the few steps to the passageway that led up to the cockpit. About halfway up, a familiar flicker from my past caught my eye. I stopped and took a step back to look at the screen above a crewman's head. My suspicions were confirmed, I laughed. "I told ye it was addictive, Adi."

Private Addison Chase jumped in her chair as she instinctively scrambled to blank her terminal. "Wha-? Oh, it's you. God, you scared me, Tag!"

"Aye, I can see that!" I replied. I gestured at her terminal - which was now showing the sensor readings that were what she should have been watching - and asked: "So ye like it?"

She grinned sheepishly and turned back to her terminal. Bringing up her hidden screen, we both stared for a moment at the frankly terrible 8-bit graphics of Galaga. "Where did you find this thing, anyway?" she asked incredulously.

I shrugged and told her: "Ye can find just about anything on the extranet."

"I know that," Addison responded, "but where did you hear about it? This game has to be a hundred years old!"

I shook my head with a grin and watched her face as I replied: "Actually, it's more like two hundred and two."

Addison's eyes widened in amazement. "Okay, now I really want to know how you heard about this!"

I shrugged, trying to hide my sudden discomfort. I have to say that I honestly hadn't thought it through when I'd introduced Private Chase to a list of admittedly antique games. But, when I'd found out that she liked vintage games, I just couldn't resist. Now I had to come up with a believable explanation that wouldn't raise Addison's suspicions.

"I told ye; I'm a fan o' the classics."

Addison was quiet for a moment. While she was thinking about it, I added: "I mean, ye've played Pong, right?"

"Of course!" she replied. "Okay, I see your point."

"Let me know when ye get through that list, and I'll give ye 'nother," I told her. "I'll talk t' ye later. I've got t' talk t' Joker. Later," I told her with a two-fingered flip from my brow as I continued up the passageway to the cockpit.

I walked on into the cockpit and up behind Joker's chair. "How's it going up here?"

Flight Lieutenant Jeff "Joker" Moreau glanced up at me without stopping what he was doing. "Well enough," he replied. "Though there are only so many times that I can check our course."

I crossed my arms and stared out the window at the blur of hyperspace. With a grin, I asked, "That bored, huh?"

He snorted and replied: "You have no idea. I think I'm actually willing to try tap dancing."

I shook my head and chuckled. With Vrolik Syndrome making the bones from his waist down as brittle as glass, Joker had about as much chance of tap dancing as pigs had of flying. "I've got a better idea: have ye e'er tried Galaga?"

It was Joker's turn to shake his head. "No way, man! Chase tried to get me in on that, too. But I prefer my games with a little more… er, everything."

I laughed and said: "Aye, I can see that. After piloting the Normandy, I don't suppose an 8-bit spaceship holds much o' a draw for ye, huh?"

"Not really, no. So, what's up?" he asked as he flipped through screens on his display. "You didn't just come up here to check on my mental state, did you? Unless… did Shepard make you the ship's counselor or something?"

I was glad that Joker couldn't see my face just then, as I flashed forward about two years or so, to a cute, friendly redhead…

"Uh, no," I replied, shaking my head. "No, he didn't… And ye're right. That's nay the reason why I came up here." I paused for a moment. Backing out was still an option at this point. After all, I shouldn't be taking any risks that the crew could use to figure out the truth about me. But, honestly, the odds of that actually happening were so slim as to be nearly nonexistent. The only member of the Normandy's crew that would even have a chance at it hadn't even been built yet.

And I really needed someone to talk to. I decided to chance it. I made sure to stay out of Joker's peripheral vision as I said: "Actually, something's been bothering me, and I wanted t' ask your opinion."

I saw Joker's hands hesitate in their perpetual dance across his terminal as he noticed the change in my tone. But you couldn't tell by his voice as he replied, "Okay. Well, I'm not usually the listening ear people seek out... But go ahead, shoot."

"What would ye do if ye knew that something terrible was going t' happen?" I asked.

Joker was quiet for a moment. Which was surprising, considering his usual off-the-cuff remarks. I guess he sensed the seriousness of my question. "Well… normally, I'd say: call Shepard. But I guess you've already tried that?"

I shook my head, then added for his benefit: "Actually, no. I can't go t' Shepard about this. What would ye do if ye knew something terrible was going t' happen unless _ye_ did something about it?"

Joker shrugged as he flipped all of his screens to the background of his display. Then he swiveled his chair around so that he could face me. He shifted slightly to get more comfortable, but I noticed that he didn't move his legs too much. With his disease, I guess he'd developed the habit of not moving his lower half more than he had to. "I don't know, Tag. I mean, I don't have a whole lot of options when it comes to doing things, you know?"

I nodded but added with a smile: "Aye, but ye have skills and resources available. Like the Normandy. What I mean is: what if something was going t' happen, but there was the slightest chance that ye could change it? The odds are against ye, but ye know that if ye give it e'erything ye've got, e'ery skill, e'ery ounce o' willpower, and e'ery bullet, ye might just be able t' change it. How hard would ye try? How much would ye put on the line t' change one thing?"

Joker considered me with an odd look. After a moment, he asked: "I think it would depend on what you were trying to change. I mean, are you trying to make sure an omni-tool doesn't get broken or trying to keep someone alive?"

I gave him a look, and said: "It's... more like the second one."

He nodded, and mumbled, "Yeah, I figured... Well, I'd give it everything I've got to keep someone alive, and I'd like to think you would, too." He paused for a second. I could see that he was thinking hard about something, so I waited.

"Are you saying that someone's going to die on Virmire?"

I shook my head and begged him with my eyes to drop it. "I can't say. Not for sure. But I promise ye, Jeff, that I'm gonna try with everything I've got t' keep anything from happening. Now, ye've got t' promise me that ye'll keep this all t' yourself. Nobody can know; not Shepard, not Alenko, not Tali. Don't tell a soul. Please."

He was quiet, and I could see that he was seriously considering telling Shepard. But after a moment, he nodded. "But," he added, pointing at me, "You promise you're gonna do your best?"

"Jeff, if something bad happens on this mission, the odds are good _I'll_ be one o' the ones that don't come back. But, if I do, I swear that I did the best I could," I told him while radiating all the sincerity I could muster.

"Good enough for me," he said. "Now, if you'll excuse me, not all of us get paid to shoot things."

"Later," I said, flipping him a salute as I turned away. "Thanks for listening, Joker."

"Anytime," he called over his shoulder.

I headed back down the passageway towards the CIC. As I passed Addison's station, she caught my eye. In response, I gestured from my eyes to hers, telling her that I was keeping an eye on her. Her reply was a much more obvious gesture. I grinned and kept walking.

I made my way around the Galaxy Map and gave my lazy salute to the marine that was posted at the door leading down to the Crew Deck. From there, I took the elevator down to the Cargo Bay. Most of the team was already down here, checking their gear and chatting. Vakarian and Wrex were over by the Mako, discussing why their respective combat styles were superior: Vakarian was a wizard with sniper rifles, while Wrex preferred shotguns… and head-butting.

They tried to get me involved, but I waved them off, saying: "Ye've seen me fight, boyo. I prefer a little more speed and agility than either o' ye. Have ye seen Tali?"

"Nah." Wrex's bass rumble rattled my teeth, but Vakarian nodded behind me towards the port side of the bay. I turned and found Tali sitting on a stool forward of where Wrex usually liked to hang out.

She was already running scans on her environmental suit, but she looked up when she heard my voice. "Hey, Tag. Over here."

"Hiya, Tike," I said as I walked over and sat cross-legged on the floor in front of her. "Ye started without me, I see."

"Well, yes," she replied, her oddly accented voice sounding unsure. "We only have about forty-five minutes before we get to Virmire, and I wanted to make sure that my suit was ready if Shepard picked me for the point-team."

I smiled at her and keyed up my omni-tool. As the orange hologram appeared on my right hand and forearm, I reassured her. "O' course. Sorry. I went t' see Joker, and time got a wee bit away from me." I synced my omni-tool to Tali's and checked her progress before keying the unit's scanner to check the quarian's suit's seals.

"It's okay," she said as she returned her attention to her own omni-tool. "It's not like I've never checked my seals without someone's help before, you know."

I snorted a laugh and glanced up at her. Her glowing eyes and the faintest outline of her nose was the only thing visible through her helmet's faceplate, but I think that I'd gotten pretty good at reading her. This time, though, I didn't have to guess; her right eye blinked.

"Hey, now! There's no need for sarcasm, young lady!" I told her as I rapped a knuckle on her knee. "I could leave ye t' do this on your own, Tike."

Tali's laugh lit up the Hangar, and I couldn't help but chuckle with her. "Yeah, yeah. Now, let's see how badly ye've clogged up your filters," I conceded, waving at her to focus.

After a moment, though, she was still laughing. "What's up? It wasn't that funny."

Tali had managed to reign her laughter into a small chuckle, but she was still shaking enough that it was messing up the scanners. "Stop it!" I ordered, laughing at her.

My sternness only made her laugh harder. By now, the rest of the team was starting to look at us. "You guys need any help over there?" Ashley called from the other end of the lockers.

I looked in her direction and glowered at Tali. "Aye. Ye don't happen t' have a sedative for quarians on hand, do ye?"

"Nope, sorry," Ashley replied. She hooked a thumb in Vakarian's direction. "You might ask Garrus; they're both dextro-DNA."

I looked imploringly to Vakarian as Tali fell off her stool and continued sobbing with laughter on the deck. But Vakarian shrugged and said, "Sorry, I used the last of my stash so I could get some sleep last night, what with Wrex's snoring."

"Hey!" the krogan replied. "I don't snore!" Which was a total lie, since I could hear him snoring through two bulkheads at night.

Waving everybody else off, I turned my attention back to Tali. She was just starting to get herself under control. "Come on, Tike. It's just nerves," I told her as I helped her back onto her stool. "Where did that come from? Ye've been on plenty of missions with Shepard."

Tali settled herself and took a few deep breaths. "Whew… I-I don't know. I mean, you're right: I have been on lots of missions with you and Shepard, but… this one feels different."

"What do ye mean?" I asked, my tone a little more cautious; I hoped my intuition was wrong, but it rarely was.

Tali's reply confirmed that I was as good as I thought I was. "Well, I mean, you seemed kind of worried about this mission when we were talking to Shepard. You've never been nervous about any other mission we've done so far…"

I was quiet for a moment while I mentally kicked my own butt. This was something that I had thought of before I joined the Normandy and her crew, but I honestly hadn't thought it would happen: Tali had bonded with me instead of Shepard.

Not romantically, mind you. I had taken great pains to make sure that that particular outcome was unlikely, and I was sufficiently confident in my ability to read the crew's body language that I was sure that wasn't the case. No, what Tali and I had was a big brother/little sister relationship, and it worked amazingly well.

But what I hadn't counted on was her relationship with me superseding her relationship with Shepard. Now, she was tuned to me instead of him, and I hadn't counted on Tali's skills at reading body language. I guess I should have seen it coming, though. After all, the quarians had gone for three-hundred years without seeing each others' faces. So it was only natural for them to have gotten really good at reading smaller, more subtle cues. Now, she had picked up on my own nerves about the upcoming mission and had misinterpreted them.

The kicker was that I couldn't tell her the real reason for my unease. As I was finding out, what with Addison and now Tali, there really was no way to observe an event without influencing it. I mean, I could have played the silent death-dealing machine part, but that just wasn't me. Plus, I don't think Captain - I mean, Admiral - Anderson would have let me join the crew if I hadn't been able to convince him that I needed to be here before he turned the ship and crew over to Shepard. And convince him, I had. David Anderson was the only person who had even a clue about who I really was and why I was here, and I'd managed to get away with telling him nothing more than the basics.

Anyway back to Tali. I had to get her focused back on the upcoming mission and make sure that she wasn't too nervous to do her job.

"Ye're right," I told her as we resumed scanning her suit. "Something about this mission is bothering me. But come on! Look at what we've already gone through with Shepard; I'm pretty sure that whatever I'm feeling isn't anything we can't handle."

Her posture told me that she was seriously pondering what I had said. More than likely, she was doubting her own capabilities, something that she'd done a few times since she joined the crew. So I added: "And besides, look at how far ye've come already, Tike! Who would've thought that a young girl out on her Pilgrimage would have ended up on a mission with a Council Spectre, tracking down a rogue Spectre who has an army of geth, aye? If ye didn't have what it takes, Shepard would've kicked ye off the ship days ago!"

Tali gave me a look (that I couldn't actually see) then asked: "Are you sure about that, Tag?"

"Which part?" I asked, a grin pulling the corner of my mouth up. "The 'kicking ye off the ship' part?"

She leaned forward and punched me in the shoulder. "The 'I've got what it takes' part, you bosh'tet!

"Aye! I'm sure," I said, pulling away from her before she could hit me again. "Come on, Tike, don't worry so much. Ye've got this."

"Well," She replied, "I suppose you're right."

"Okay," I said, relieved that I had once again sidestepped a potential problem. "Now, can we finish this? We've only thirty-five minutes left."

Together, it only took us five more minutes to finish the checks. As Tali headed over to her locker, I walked over to where Vakarian and Wrex were still having their friendly argument.

"That's the dumbest thing I've ever heard, turian!" Wrex's bass rumble carried all the way across the Cargo Bay, causing everyone to glance over.

Okay, so maybe it wasn't so friendly, anymore.

As I got closer, I heard Vakarian reply, saying: "No, seriously. The Mantis is the best sniper rifle ever built."

"But," Wrex said, still sounding grumpy, "the Naginata X is more powerful!"

"It's not all about stopping power, Wrex," I said as I joined them. "The Mantis is 12% more accurate."

"Exactly!" Vakarian said. "A skilled marksman can put a round from the Mantis anywhere he wants, which more than makes up for the 8% less stopping power."

"Yeah?" Wrex replied. "Well, a blast to the face from a Sokolov will stop anything. And you don't even have to aim!" With that, he walked off, laughing to himself.

Vakarian and I glanced at each other, and I shrugged. "At least he's in a good mood."

The turian chuckled as he hefted his Mantis rifle. "True. I'd hate to see him in a bad mood." He turned to me and asked, "What's on your mind?"

I shrugged and leaned back again the Mako, taking a deep breath and letting it out. "Nothing much. Just taking a breather 'fore we get t' Virmire."

Vakarian nodded and leaned back beside me. "I understand. This mission sounds like it has the possibility of a little more unexpected excitement than we've had so far."

I snorted at that. "Really? So, what? Ye were _expecting_ a giant sentient plant creature on Feros? And the geth on Therum?"

Vakarian opened his mouth to reply, then clicked it shut. He thought for a moment, then chuckled. "No, I guess not. But you have to admit that this one feels a little different."

I was quiet for a moment as I tried to keep my paranoia in check. There was no way that the turian was picking up on my nerves like Tali had; we weren't that close. No, he probably just had his own nerves. "Aye," I replied, "the fact that an STG team went silent is worrying. Not saying that it never happens, but it's still creepifying."

I could feel Vakarian turning to give me a look. "'Creepifying'?"

"Aye. As in 'inducing a creepy feeling'," I replied. "'Creepifying'."

Vakarian nodded. "Well, you're right: it is creepifying. STG teams don't usually need help. And they don't usually go silent on a mission."

I nodded back as I watched Tali and Alenko check their weapons. "That's what I thought, too. So, what do ye think we'll find down there? Another unique alien? Rachni? A krogan breeding colony? Maybe a thresher maw monster-nest?"

Vakarian shook his head, chuckling. "I wouldn't be saying that if I were you! The way things have been going for us, we're likely to find _all_ of that down there!"

That made me snort harder. "Ye're probably right. Boy, wouldn't that be fun?"

Vakarian laughed out loud at that. "McTaggart, I'm not a professional, but I think there's something seriously wrong with you!"

"Ye're probably right about that, too," I said with a shrug. "But I don't let it slow me down."

Vakarian chuckled again, then we fell into a comfortable silence as we watched the rest of the team get ready for the mission. Vakarian was always ready to go, and I only needed about five minutes.

Several minutes passed, during which Liara came down and started checking her armor. I sensed Vakarian stir slightly, so I knew something was coming. I didn't have long to wait before he asked: "How's Tali doing?

I have to admit, his question was a little surprising. But I shrugged. "She's okay. Just a wee bit nervous, but she's ready t' go." I paused for a second, then asked: "Are ye worried about her?"

His response was a fraction of a second too quick as he said: "No. She's a good kid. She's quick, smart, and skilled. There's not much to worry about." He looked at me then, and said: "I was actually wondering if _you_ were worried about her."

Okay, that one caught me off guard. I finally turned my head towards Vakarian and rubbed the stubble on my head. "What do ye mean? Why would I be worried about her?"

Vakarian shrugged. "No reason, really. It just seems like the two of you spend a lot of time together. Like maybe..."

I waited for him to continue, but when he didn't, I finished for him. "Like maybe there's something going on between us?" He shrugged again and spread his hands as if to say: you said it, not me. "It's not like that, boyo. She's like the little sister I-" I broke off suddenly, surprised that I had let myself slip. There was no way to hide it, either. My only hope was that Vakarian didn't act on it.

Unfortunately, Garrus Vakarian had been a C-Sec officer right up until he had joined Shepard's crew, and cops didn't stop being cops when they gave up their badges. "'Like the little sister you' what? Never had?"

I sagged back against the Mako and bounced my head back off a side panel. I knew that I was going to have to tell him, at least so that he would trust me later when I had to lie about something more important. But that didn't make it any less painful to talk about.

"There was a girl, back home." I paused, biting back against a surge of melancholy and pain. I figured that Vakarian would make the logical leap from my aborted reply, but he stayed silent, waiting for me to go on.

"She wasn't actually me little sister, and she still had her parents. But they weren't really around, so I kind of adopted her. I taught her how to drive, intimidated her suitors, chaperoned her first date, bought her her first drink. I was there for almost every major event in her life." I hesitated then, as my mind flashed back to the past.

"Except for the night she died." I had my eyes closed as I told him. Even after all these years, I could still see her face. And it still hurt just as much. "Her boyfriend had been drinking, and he never saw the other car."

Vakarian was quiet. I could see from the corner of my teary eye that he wasn't looking at me, and for that, I was grateful. After a silent moment, he asked: "What did you do? To the boyfriend, I mean."

I barked a hard laugh at that. "Nothing. He died in the crash, too." I saw the look that Vakarian shot me at my response. I grinned as I finally turned to face him. "It was for the best; I'm pretty sure I would've handled it a lot worse than I did."

Vakarian nodded, and I knew that he knew exactly what I was talking about. "How _did_ you handle it?"

"Like I said: poorly. Lots of drinking. Lots of fighting. Moved into a new apartment."

"A new apartment? Why?"

Another grin. "I kind of… _broke_ me old one."

Vakarian laughed at that. "I can see that. You were pretty close to her, I guess. What was her name, if you don't mind my asking?"

I blinked hard before replying. "Actually, I do mind. No offense, but her name is the only thing I have left of her. I know it's an… uncommon keepsake, but that's what I have."

"I understand," Vakarian replied. "And Tali reminds you of her?"

"Aye," I replied, bouncing my head off of the Mako again. I looked across the Cargo Bay to where Tali was helping Liara with her armor. "Way too much, sometimes. She's about the same size, same build, same age. Similar sense of humor. Even her laugh is the same. I know it's stupid - and potentially painful - but it feels like..."

When I trailed off, blinking back tears again, Vakarian finished for me. "It's like you have a second chance with your little sister. I can understand that." He leaned back against the Mako. "You're right, though, you know. You may just end up getting hurt again."

I shook my head at that, hard. "Not a chance in hell, boyo. I'm a lot more powerful than I was then, and I'm not gonna let anything happen to Tali." I looked at him and added: "I could use your help with that, actually."

He only thought about for about half a second before replying. "I'm in. But let's not tell her, okay?"

I bumped his outstretched fist. "Ye read me mind, boyo. I'm gonna go suit up." I gave him a two-fingered salute, pushed away from the Mako, and headed towards the lockers.

I walked up to my locker and keyed it open. As I reached inside, Tali caught my eye over Liara's shoulder. She tilted her head, and I knew she could see that my eyes were still a little teary. I shrugged, shook my head, and smiled at her, all at the same time, to tell her that it was nothing.

She ignored me, though, and moved to step around Liara, which caused the asari to turn, too.

"Are you okay, McTaggart?" Liara asked.

I shot Tali a dirty look and replied: "Aye. I just pulled a nose hair, is all. Made me eyes water."

I don't think either woman actually believed me, but they left me alone, though I had to tell Tali to go check her weapons to get her to go.

After they left, I turned back to my locker. I reached in and pulled out the boots of my armor, setting them on the ground. I slid my fingertip under the inside lip as if pressing a hidden catch. In response, the back of the boots hinged open, and I slid my feet into them. As the boots swung closed around my lower legs, the inside of them liquefied. The living, microscopic organisms that made up both the Armor and my clothes bonded together, and the Armor used the extra mass to quickly replicate more of itself.

On the outside, it merely looked as if my boots slid extra plates up around my thighs as I reached back into my locker and pulled out the torso of my armor. I slipped it over my head and flipped the locks closed. The locks were unnecessary. The living substance of the Armor allowed it to change its shape fluidly. But I didn't want the team to be any more suspicious of me than they already were.

Next out were the gauntlets. I slipped them onto each forearm and waited the handful of seconds for them to absorb the remainder of my clothes. As all the pieces of the Armor slid plates out to join itself, I felt the familiar and welcome tingle of reawakening senses as the Armor's "systems" activated and connected to the various implants and specialized nerve clusters in my body.

It felt good to be whole again.

Well, almost whole. I reached back into the locker and pulled out my pistol. Designed to look exactly like a Spectre's HMWP X Master Pistol, it was so much more. Just like my armor, it was alive and therefore didn't need ammo, not even the super-dense block that normal weapons sheared their ammo from. I activated my omni-tool, for show, and keyed the pistol to fire phasic rounds, which cut through enemy shields. I clipped it onto my left thigh, quick-draw style.

Reaching back into the locker, I pulled out my shotgun. Unlike even the Spectre HMWSG X Master Shotgun it resembled, mine could still fire every two seconds, even though it was firing high explosive rounds. Powerful enough to blow the crap out of just about anything, the only reason that more people didn't use them in every weapon they carried was because of the tremendous heat output. Even the most advanced weapon could only fire the things once every several seconds.

I clipped the shotgun to the small of my back and, as it folded down into its low-profile carrying shape, I reached into the locker for the last of my weapons. A veteran Spectre would have mistaken my rifle for an authentic HMWA X Master Assault Rifle. A ridiculous rate of fire, coupled with a high damage rating and incredible accuracy, made it my long-range weapon of choice. I flipped it over my right shoulder and clipped it into its carrying slot.

As it folded down, I pulled the last piece of my armor out of the locker and keyed it shut. I tucked my helmet under my arm and headed over to the Weapons Bench, where Tali and Ashley were talking.

"How're things going over here, ladies?" I asked, setting my helmet on the edge of the bench.

"Pretty good," Tali replied. "Ashley was just helping me with my shotgun. How's Garrus?"

"He's good. He's ready to go, is all. Though, who knows who Shepard's going to pick for the mission."

"Depends on what the scans show when we get there, I guess," Ashley said without looking up from Tali's gun.

"True," I shrugged. I had been trying to figure that out myself since the mission briefing. I knew who I would pick for the mission, but that was because I knew what was coming. It didn't matter, anyway: not my call.

Right on cue, the lift door slid open and Shepard walked into the Cargo Bay. He was already in his dark grey armor, with his red-and-white N7 badge blazoned on the right side of his chest plate. He nodded towards Vakarian and clapped Alenko on the shoulder as he walked by. Stepping up to the Weapons Bench, he gave me a nod and asked Ashley: "How's everything going, Chief?"

"It's good, Skipper," Ashley replied. She straightened up and handed Tali back her shotgun. "It's ready to go, Tali. You just had some buildup on the heat diffusion plate."

"Thanks, Ashley," Tali replied, clipping the gun to the small of her back.

I saw the look that passed between Shepard and Ashley, so I checked the countdown on my Retinal Display. There were still a few minutes left, and there was still something that I needed to do, so I bumped Tali's shoulder and gestured with my head. "Can I talk to ye for a second, Tike?"

She looked up at me, catching the obvious tone of my voice. "Um… sure. Thanks again, Ashley," she said as she headed back over towards the lockers.

I gave Shepard a nod and said, "We'll be ready when ye are, Commander," as I followed Tali. We walked back over to where Tali had been when I came down. She looked at me expectantly, and I smiled.

"Honestly, for the most part, I just wanted to give Shepard and Ash some space," I told her.

"Oh... okay," she replied, glancing around the Cargo Bay.

I knew I had to say something before things got weird. I jumped in without really thinking about what I was going to say. "Tike, I'm sorry about shutting ye out earlier. It's just that I needed a minute to myself."

"It's okay, Tag," she replied. "I thought it was something like that. What were you and Garrus talking about? If you don't mind me asking, that is."

I looked past her, off into space, for a moment. Did I really want to get into that with her right now? I decided that I didn't. "I'll tell ye what: when we finish this mission - when we catch Saren - I'll tell ye all about it. Deal?"

Tali grinned (at least, that was the sense I got) and said: "Deal!"

Fortunately, I was saved from any more potentially awkward conversations by Joker's voice over the Comm. " _Commander, we're in-system. Saren's flagship, Sovereign, is here, but our stealth systems are fully operational. We'll be in Virmire's atmosphere in fifteen minutes. Scans are coming up now. You know, if you want to check them out. Get a plan. That kind of thing."_

We all looked over at Shepard as he glanced up towards the ceiling and all but rolled his eyes. "Thanks, Joker. I'll have a look when I have the time." He turned and keyed on the display above the Weapons Bench as we all gathered around.

"There's where the STG signal came from," Ashley said, pointing. "But it doesn't look like we're getting the Normandy in there."

"Not with those AA towers guarding the approach," Vakarian agreed.

Shepard nodded. "It looks like we're going to have to deploy a team in the Mako to take out the towers so the Normandy can land."

"Why am I not surprised?" I asked.

Wrex grinned and said: "I was thinking the same thing."

Ashley ignored us and asked: "Who's going with you in the Mako, Skipper?"

Shepard didn't reply right away. He considered the scans for a few more seconds before making his decision. "It looks like Saren's prepared for us; he knows that we have to take out the AA towers first, and he's deployed the geth all along the route. And it looks pretty open; not a lot of cover." He thought for a few more seconds. Then: "Okay. Tali, your expertise with the geth will be an asset; you're up."

The young quarian didn't even glance my way. "Yes, Commander. I'm ready."

Shepard nodded, and continued: "Garrus, I think your Tech abilities and sniper skills were custom-made for this mission; you'll come, too."

Vakarian nodded and replied: "I was thinking the same thing, Commander. I just finished calibrating my rifle; I can't wait to put it to the test."

"Sounds good," Shepard said with a small grin. Then he glanced at me. "The four of us will drop in the Mako, take out all geth opposition, and disable the AA towers."

I don't know what Anderson had told the Commander when he handed over the Normandy and made sure that I was on the crew, but the Admiral hadn't let me down. Shepard had included me on every mission so far, picking the rest of the squad to fit around the two of us.

"The rest of you, sit tight with Joker and the Normandy, and we'll see you at the STG camp." As the mission-team headed across the Cargo Bay towards the Mako, I noticed the expressions on the faces of the four that were staying behind. Liara didn't seem too broken up about not going, but it was easy to see that Urdnot Wrex was itching to kill something. The eight-foot-tall reptile stomped over to his usual spot next to the lockers and huffed as he crossed his arms and leaned back against the wall. I knew that he'd be alright, though. Even though krogan were impatient by nature, one didn't get to be as old as Wrex without developing at least a little patience.

I could tell that Kaidan was anxious about the team going without him, but he trusted Shepard's decisions. And he was a professional Marine, so he was content to do what was asked of him.

Ashley, too, was a professional, but everybody knew that she didn't like being left off of the ground team. She and Shepard didn't say anything to each other, but they did share a quick, loaded glance. I'll admit, I felt a little like an intruder, there, but that's the curse of being as observant as I am.

I joined Tali and Vakarian by the Mako. As the turian climbed inside and began the startup sequence, I noticed that Tali seemed to have gotten over her earlier nervousness. "Feeling better?" I asked.

She looked up at me and nodded. "Yes. Thanks for the pep talk. I think it helped. Plus, the geth are something I can handle. I mean, they're dangerous and all, but I've fought them before, and I know all about machines."

I patted her shoulder and said: "That ye do, Tike. Let's go kick some synthetic bahookie."

She laughed and replied: "Yes, let's!" She followed Vakarian up into the Mako as Shepard walked over from the Weapons Bench, his helmet under his arm.

"Ye ready for this, bossman?" I asked, looking down at him. Though the Commander was the epitome of the stereotypical hero, I was still two or so inches taller than he was. Besides that and our eyes (his are blue, mine are brown), there's not much difference between us. Oh, I'm much better looking… but I haven't got that many people to back me up on that.

He grinned and nodded back as he raised his helmet. He put the thing on and engaged the seals, then said: "I'm ready to catch Saren, and I don't care how many geth he throws at us."

I grinned back, but, before I could reply, Joker's voice came over the comm. " _We're approaching the drop zone, Commander. ETA: ninety seconds."_

Shepard gestured for me to precede him into the Mako. "All aboard, team!" As I climbed in, he waved to the four staying behind and told Ashley: "Tell Joker that we'll have those towers down, soon. Until then: not a scratch on the Normandy."

Ashley grinned as she and Liara headed for the lift. "I'll be very specific, Skipper."

I was settling into my seat by the hatch when Shepard climbed in up front, next to Vakarian, who was just finishing the startup sequence. "You ready, team?" he asked us.

"I'm ready, Commander," Tali replied from her seat next to me.

"Affirmative, Shepard," was Vakarian's response. His helmet was contoured to fit his head, including the spars of bone that protruded from the back of his head, kind of giving him the look of a reversed ice-pick. The glass of his faceplate was black and T-shaped, reflecting the lights from the console in front of him.

I was in the process of putting on my own helmet, so I took a moment before replying. The helmet sealed against the collar of the Armor, the two pieces fusing together to create one, whole organism as the helmet's "systems" integrated with the Armor's and my own. It's not something that I can describe accurately, but there was kind of a tingling feeling, and senses that I didn't even know I was missing (but felt like I couldn't live without) came alive again. The world around me took on new layers: I could feel, taste, hear, and even sense things that nobody else could. It didn't even feel like I was wearing armor, in fact. It felt like I was… well, _whole._

I shook my head slightly as I acclimated before saying: "I'm good, bossman. Let's rock."


End file.
